Dave Holt

They do look remarkably good, considering the age of the kit. Amazing what a bit of extra effort can bring. I have to admit to being old enough to have a cupboard full of these kits - although I haven't! I do have one or two built, including original Studiolith rocking W-irons and wheels. Unfortunately, I didn't make any improvements to the mouldings, so I might have to re-visit these (they've never been finished/painted, to at least address the door hinges. They might then do as a stop-gap till i can do something better. I'll keep an eye out for Craigs steel mineral chassis, then. Dave.

Thanks for the kind comments. Tony: Beware! Mr Waterman has probably trade marked all uses of those letters - like the use of the word "Virgin" by another entrepeneur. Craig: It might be the camera settings. With a zoom lens, it's tempting to fill the shot without paying much atention to the focal length that results - and, of course, this can affect the perspective of the view. The other thing is that I loaded the photos out of sequence. I took shots 2 & 3 with just the station board on its own. I then placed the adjacent board, with the coal drops, and took photos 1 & 4, so the view really is shorter in the 3rd shot! Sorry for any confusion caused! Dave.

I collected the superb station building, platform, goods shed building and signal box from Gravy Train on Saturday and couldn't wait to try them in situ. Thought I'd place an appropriate Donkey train in the platform for some of the shots. Dave.

Following some final adjustments to the deck sections (some time ago, I accidentally broke the deck into two pieces by dropping it onto a quarry tile floor!), I have now got the fit to my liking and have made a final dry run with the assembly. Now it's take a deep breath and fix it in place on top of the pillars, permanently. I've not quite decided on the best adhesive, yet. The options appear to be PVA, Uhu or epoxy. The deck is wood and the pillars a mix of wood and plastic, on the contact areas. Here are a few rather poor quality photos of the deck in place. I think more lighting or the flash would have been beneficial! First, a plan view. Some of the cross beams are missing and will be added once the main longitudinals are fixed Some views from the front. Mmmm! That angle-poise lamp does look a bit out of scale!

Thanks for the kind comments. Peter: Yes, I can't wait to see the buildings in place - it will then start to look more like the real thing. Curves rule, OK! The final scenic board also curves back out to follow the road and give room for the scenic break to disguise the end of the layout. In addition, there will be some light-weight, scenery only, boards along the back of the layout, not just the dead straight edge to the track support boards, as currently seen. These haven't been started yet. The intention is to present the layout at a fairly high level (I think I've set the rail height at 1200 mm above ground level - if I seem a bit vague about this, I'm posting from work (lunch time!) and haven't got my notes to hand) - so it's viewed more or less side on, as if from a low hillside across the vally rather than as a helecopter pilot! There will be a pelmet, etc., and backdrop provided by drapes to give a "letter box slot" arrangement. Lighting will be mounted behind the pelmet and, hopefully, arranged so as to avoid intrusive shadows. Time will tell! But that's a long way off, yet. Craig: As you say, even a very modest facility is long in 4 mm, if built to scale. The coal staithes (drops?) will be a key feature, being right near the front and roughly central along the layout. The ramp you refer to is the basic support for a road which runs along the front of the layout for its full length (except where the river makes a brief on/off appearance in a sharp curve at a slightly lower level than the road). The road drops down almost the whole length of the boards shown with a grass embankment behind a stone retaining wall (increasing in height as the road not only drops down, but gets nearer the edge of the formation towards the far end before turning away and climbing towards the far end of the next board). Various trees and bushes (hawthorn, ellderberry, brambles, etc) line the railway boundary and will probably interfere with viewing of trains! (But not too much, I hope.) Cheers, Dave.

Now I've got all three boards with track laid at home, I was able to assemble the three together for the first time on the lounge/diner floor - after moving a bit of furniture and a rug! The three sections together are just over 12 feet long, with another scenic board (as yet without track) to take the line off to the fiddle yard (at the far end, in the photos). Current work includes fitting the point motors, TOU's and Alex Jackson uncoupling magnets under the boards, together with trimming some rail ends at the board joints, opening up some rail joints for rail expansion and electrical isolation purposes and cosmetic rail joints at the appropriate positions (these latter cut into or through the rail head but not right through the full rail section). Then it's on to the wiring. I think I will get three of the support boards made up, so i can have the boards at a good working height. Kneeling on the floor isn't doing my knees any good, despite use of a foam kneeling pad (intended for gardening!). Photos show the three boards assembled on the floor. Dave.

Robin, A super looking model - Peter certainly does superb work (as you know he's done/doing buildings for me, also). The idea of having the wagon hoist working will add visual interest although actually having the tippler function might be a bit much and would presumably require granular loads in the wagons so they go up full, and come down empty? The Carnforth tower does look a bit worse for wear in your photos - I think that not being able to go up was probably just as well, otherwise we might not have your continuing posts on progress! Looking at the model, I'm intrigued by the bare brass vertical columns. Are these temporary supports to help hold the thing rigid prior to installation, to be removed, or are they permanent but just not yet painted? Looking forward to further updates. Dave.

As you say! I wonder if the works just ignored the BR spec and carried on as per pre-nationalisation, where most locos did have red frames? Mind you, unless you're creating an ex-works version, i imagine the inside of the frames got very dirty, quite quickly and weren't cleaned between works visits - so the original colour is probably accademic. Dave.

According to the official painting spec, BR standard locos were painted black inside the frames, not red as most people believe - based on preserved locos? Regards, Dave.

Finally got fired up again today and went over to the work-shop to retrieve two more boards for equipping with point motors, AJ uncoupling magnets and wiring. Based on how long it took to wire the first board, I expect to re-emerge some time next year!!! Took the opportunity to trial fit the coal drop deck with the boards assembled. This revealed the need for a bit of trimming to length which was done. Unfortunately, there's been a slight warping of the main timbers, so this will have to be sorted on final attachment. That explains the slight vertical misalignment between the deck rails and the siding rails at each end, visible in the photos. Some rail ends also had to be cut back to avoid them touching at the board joints. Dave.

Hi, Captain! On the sole Delph board where I've got as far as cosmetic fish-plates, I only used the P4 Track Co version where I needed electrical isolation (just near the crossing on the point - even then, as you say, the moulding has to be split to fit each side of the rail). Otherwise, I used etched brass (Brassmasters) glued only to the visible side of the rails (cheating, I know - but the other side will never be seen and it halves the number needed). The exception to this was where I have fitted a buffer stop to the end of a siding where I used the P4 TC items whole, as intended, as I fixed the buffer stop after laying the track. I must say, the etched versions are not quite as crisp in detail as the plastic mouldings, but I doubt that can be detected on the finished track, after weathering and at normal viewing distance. The main advantage is not having to file the pip of the rear face before attaching to the rail. Dave.

Mmmm..... Sheep Pasture? Bet the 9F would look interesting on there!!!! Dave.

Robin, It was nice to have a (far too) brief chat on Sunday - and also with Paul & Morgan. Shame I couldn't spend more time but I was on a tight schedule. As it was, i arrived bang on ten and checked my watch a few minutes later and it was 1 o'clock - half an hour past my planned departure time! Anyway, it's good to see/hear of steady progress and I look forward to further up-dates here. Regards, Dave.

Thanks for the positive comments. I will probably leave the colour as is for now - I can always make some slight changes later by dry brushing with lighter grey, if needed. Eventually, I'll apply some very fine coal dust for texture, especially in odd corners, although I imagine in the 1950's the deck would be kept reasonably clear for safety reasons. Robin, The chairs are P4Track Co (or Exactoscale) functional bridge chairs - which have a narrower base than a standard chair. These were I glued to the (obeche) support beams using Plastic Magic solvent. I tried a less aggressive alternative recently (on some cosmetic chairs) and found it didn't fix them properly. I also inserted some brass pins (with the heads filed to fit inside the moulded recess in the chair bases) at a few locations to aid alignment. Since your ash-pit supports are brass fabrications, perhaps brass chairs soldered on at a few places for strength and then plastic chairs in between would be useful? Dave.

As Tay Bridge says........ Robin, Looking very smart indeed. Could you not use the one you've made as a pattern and have some cast? Look forward to having a chat on Sunday. Dave.

Due to personal reasons, I haven't done much modelling in the past 7 months, but some slight progress (and a bit of regress) has been made with the coal drops. The latter was caused by my dropping the deck unit onto a quarry tiled floor, causing it to disintegrate such that the two longitudinals carrying the rails are now separate items which will have to be fixed to the supports individually. The progress has been to make the hand-rails for the deck and do the basic painting prior to fixing. On balance, I think it's probably a bit too dark as heavily weathered wood seems to be a silvery grey colour but I have no idea what the actual Delph drops looked like in this respect. Dave.

Hi, Cap'n, I think the key point in the sellection of motive power is what claims you make for the layout and its operation. My preference is to see layouts operating credible combinations of stock, typical of the area and era modelled, but not slavish adherence to actual items used - unless, of course, the layout claims historical accuracy. In my view, this approach is equaly valid for both models of actual places and ficticious but typical locations. As you probably know, my own layout is based on a real place, but I've altered history in the interests of greater operational potential. Hopefully, my sellection of stock/operations will have an air of credibility of the "yes, that could have happened" sort. In the end, it's your layout and you can run what you like providing you are up front about it. Cheers, Dave.

I'm sure that had these locos actually been built, BR would have tried to use as many standard valve gear components as possible; so the union links would be the same as the Brit/9F/Cl 5. THe answer is that the connecting rods are perhaps still too short? Regarding the combination lever length, it looks as if the top end is a bit too high, perhaps because the etched valve spindle (an extension of the radius rod on the Comet etch) isn't at quite the same slope as the valve chest centre line? THis should correct itself if you use a separate valve spindle, as you mention. Dave.

Sorry to read of your problems, but it's better to sort this out now rather than when more parts have been added. For my own locos, I much prefer to draw things out - possibly larger than full model size - before I start cutting metal. It's a lot easier to change a drawing than change the model itself. Good luck, anyway. Dave.

Nice work with the forked end/lifting arrangement, but if you don't mind me saying so, the valve rod looks a bit too long. The front boss should align with the middle of the valve cross-head slides. If it doesn't, then the relationship with the combination lever and anchor link to the cross-head will be wrong. Regards, Dave.

Robin, The completed building does look very impressive. It'll be interesting to watch developments with the turn-table bridge structure, operating mechanism and the control arrangements. I'm sure you'll keep us updated from time to time. As a matter of interest, did you come to any final conclusions about the main shed roof trusses and the best way to model them? Also, what happens to the open side of the shed (where the pits run off the edge of the base-board? Will this be left open or filled by the layout back-scene? Looking forward to seeing progress at Scaleforum. Regards, Dave.

Phew! As possibly the main instigator of this fairly drastic surgery, I'm mightily relieved it all went well. The shortening looks neat and I'm sure it will be invisible once filled/dressed up and painted. Regarding the lubricators, on my BR standards, I've carved away the underside of the footplate where the opening is and mounted the lubricators on the slide-bar support bracket, as part of the chassis. This allows representation of the rather delicate drive rods without permanently connecting the chassis and body. You can only really see the front face of the lubricators, so you don't need to model the whole thing and that reduces the amout of footplate material to be removed. When removing the moulded detail from the boiler, I'd retain the longitudinal pipe cover, which looks nicely detailed. Think twice about removing the vacuum ejector from the side of the smokebox because there isn't a realistic replacement available (all the add-ons I've seen have been for the LMS style, which is quite different in appearance). Alternatively, you can scratch build a replacement - I did and only just escaped with my sanity (although some might question this!!). In my view, the Alan Gibson castings represent all the other BR standard boiler fittings very well but are a bind to drill out for the piping wires! - Expect to break loads of small drills. Looking forward to further updates. Dave.

Tim, In the current financial climate, I doubt if there'll be much expansion of the canal network in the next few years, however beneficial it may be. As for 14 plus exhibitions, how on earth do you find that mant decent ones to attend? My list for 2010 is something like: Leamington (local) Scalefour North Derby - one off visit helping on Amlwch Railex Scalefour AGM - exceptional visit so I could see Barrow Road Scaleforum Warley NEC So that's 5 regulars plus 2 one-offs, still well short of 14 and leaving plenty of time for helping restore 35006 and visiting Ffestiniog/Welsh Highland Railways and monitoring progress with Lyd (replica Lynton & Barnstaple 2-6-2 tank being built at Boston Lodge by FR). Happy canalling (is that a verb?)! Dave.

Oh dear! I seem to have opened a can of worms. Sorry! However, I agree with Flood, once you've spotted an error it has to be sorted, otherwise it'll become the only thing you see every time you look at the model. So my advice is - teeth firmly on bullet and make the modifications now before it's too late! I've had the same situation myself and have regretted a couple of things I didn't correct at the time. Regards, Dave.

Looking at the weight diagrams in the Cox book, the proposed boiler for the 2-8-2 was identical to that on the Britannia so, barring any significant errors in the Hornby body, then the front of the firebox should be in the right place. Looking at the diagrams, the position of the cab and rear of the firebox relative to the rear pony-truck axle is the same on both designs. On the Brit, working forward from the truck axle, there was 10' minus half a wheel (3' - 1") to the rear edge of the rear driver = 6' - 11". On the 2-8-2, we have 9' - 6" - 2' - 7.5" = 6' - 10.5". So there is only half an inch difference in the gap between the rear drivers and the front of the firebox on the two designs. You mention that the front end of the frames was altered, so perhaps this is the area where the discrepancy has arisen? Again, looking at the diagrams, the 2-8-2 is 6" (2 mm) shorter than the Brit from the front buffer beam to the rear truck axle. As shown above, the rear end is almost identical, so all the difference is taken up somewhere near the front of the loco. For modelling purposes, it might be best to split the difference and have an extra millimetre at both ends? Hope you resolve this to your satisfaction as it's a great project. I recall that somewhere earlier in the blog you wrote something that suggested that to some extent you were designing the model as you went along (position of frame spacers, perhaps?). I don't think i could do that - all my models are planned out on paper to the n'th degree, with doubtful aspects drawn out to scale, before I make anything! This approach does add quite a bit of time to a project, but generally avoids problems later on. Regards, Dave.