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Dave Holt

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  1. Dave Holt
    I've now completed the modifications to the two coaches (apart from the AJ coupling at the loco end) and have painted the new bogies and also the coach underframes. Probably at bit of weathering on the sides, ends and roofs, when I set up my airbrush - warmer weather allowing work outside or in the garage, I think.
    Here are the coaches in their current state.
    First, the brake composite non-driving trailer:
     

     
    and the 12 wheel driving trailer:
     

     
    Dave.
  2. Dave Holt

    Rebuilt Royal Scot, 46109 - Pt 8

    By Dave Holt,


    4 mm, P4
    Well, the Scot is now complete except for some details to be added after painting. The last parts to be added were the smoke deflectors which, to my eyes, make quite a difference to the overall look of the loco.
    Here it is, connected to the tender, prior to disassembling to cleaning and painting.

     Dave.
  3. Dave Holt

    Rebuilt Royal Scot, 46109 - Pt5

    By Dave Holt,


    4 mm, P4
    Progress continues at a slow(ish) pace. Since the last entry, the main visual change has been fitting the boiler (still loose at the moment), which required the removal of quite a lot of resin to pass over the motor and sit down on the splasher tops/footplate.
    Recently, I've been working on the lubrication system, sand boxes/fillers and some initial boiler fittings.
    Here's a couple of overall views of the loco in its current state.

     

     
    Dave.
  4. Dave Holt

    Rebuilt Royal Scot, 46109 - Pt4

    By Dave Holt,


    4 mm, P4
    Apart from the motor/gearbox torque restrainer and the pick-ups, I think the chassis is now complete. The last cosmetic items fitted were the front foot steps and bracing struts and the two injector overflow pipes.
    All the parts have been re-assembled, partly to check the assembly sequence. After inserting ten 14 BA screws into the keeper plate, I discovered that the eccentric strap cannot be fitted into the sheaf unless the axle is partially withdrawn from the horns - somewhat frustrating but, hopefully, I'll remember for the future. With the keeper plate split in two (a mistake I now realise) and entwined with the brake rigging and the exhaust injector steam pipe floating around, it's a bit of a fiddle to get everything into place so the screws can be fitted. Three pinged out of the tweezers but were later retrieved, much to my relief.
    Here we see both sides and the under side and top.

     

     

     


    Dave.
  5. Dave Holt

    Black 5 update.

    By Dave Holt,

    Not much progress, but the loco and tender are now connected. The loco and tender kits are from different periods of design and manufacture and the adjustable draw bar supplied with the loco is far too long for the later tender. The fault really lies with the tender because the draw bar pivot is far too close to the buffer beam whereas the earlier tenders were about scale in this respect. The more recent tender is not easily modified to correct this aspect, so the only solution was to make a hybrid draw bar using the etched bar at the loco end and a new part, incorporating a formed eye, made from 0.8 mm brass wire at the tender end. It took a couple of goes soldering the two pieces together to get just the right pivot centre distance so that the rubbing blocks touch but allow the required movement between loco and tender. Although the gap between loco and tender is almost scale, the fall plates on the loco do not land on the front platform on the tender, so some further work is required on this aspect.

    Dave.
  6. Dave Holt
    I was very please to accept an invitation to run some stock on the Manchester Model Railway Club's "Slattocks Junction" P4 layout recently. As the layout is set on the Manchester to Rochdale line, it is the perfect setting for my locos as I hope the photo shows. Besides railways, in various scales, I have a great interest in the cotton mills which dominated the landscape of my native Oldham during my childhood so, I have been pleased to be able to help in some small way with encouragement and some architectural information in the marvelous model of "Alpha Mill", which appears , or rather dominates, the background of the photo. The photo was taken by my good friend, David Clarke who, as explained in earlier entries, painted, lined and weathered the featured loco.
     

     

     
    Here we see Caprotti fitted Black 5, 44741 at the head of a parcels train passing the mill and then on to the canal bridge.
     
    Besides 44741, I took three other locos which ran with varying degrees of success. My Stanier 2-6-4 tank ran faultlessly, the Crab struggled a bit with the weight of an 8 coach passenger train, whilst Jubilee 45701 ran well but had an intermittent short as did EE type 4 diesel, D211. Later investigation of the Jubilee revealed a brake hanger had become dislodged and was catching one of the driving wheel flanges. Unfortunately, this required a major disassembly to put right, but this has been achieved without damage to the finish. I think the diesel was just on the limit of curvature it can accommodate.
    Anyway, thanks to all the guys in the Manchester club for their warm welcome and kind hospitality and allowing me to play trains for an afternoon.
     
    Dave.
  7. Dave Holt
    Last time I took my Jubilee. 45701, to run on the NLG test track, it refused to move and showed a fault message "AU5" or "AUS" on the controller. I thought at the time that maybe a pick-up had moved in transport or that there was a chip fault. Anyway, try fiddling with the controller I could not get it to move so it was put away for a future time.
    Last weekend, I was chatting to "Barrow Road" at the Leamington show and the subject of a visit to run suitable locos was mentioned. Now, a Jubilee is a very suitable loco for this layout, so my thoughts turned to trying to sort the problem out. The main issue was the necessity of dismantling the model, with the risk of damage to the finish, in order to access the suspect items. Before starting, I again tried the loco on my short test track and had intermittent movement and then error messages, this time error 01 and 02.
    So, reluctantly I separated the tender, removed the boiler and finally the footplate/cab from the chassis. At each stage i checked for shorts of items out of place but to no avail. It appeared to be a damaged chip or burnt out motor (coreless type). I decided to unsolder the chip leads and refit the bridging bars to enable DC operation to check the motor, starting with the LH side. When I turned the chassis over to do the RH side, I discovered that the wire connecting the RH pick-ups to the connection pad was hanging free. It appears that I had made a dry joint which must have made intermittent contact - hence the problem.
    I quickly remade the failed connection and then reconnected the LH side chip wires and, hey presto, normal behaviour when placed on the test rack.
    The loco was re-checked at each stage of reassembly although there were a couple of hiccups along the way. First, I couldn't find the screw which holds the front of the footplate to the chassis, search as I might. So a new screw was fashioned - it's a very short 8BA but has to have the head reduced in diameter to fit. Then, as I prepared to re-attach the tender, the special screw through the draw bar pinged out of the tweezers. An hour or so on hands and knees failed to find it but did find the missing footplate screw! No option but to make a replacement. The original included a long, Alan Gibson crank-pin bush and I could not find another despite searching my spares boxes and several other Brassmasters loco/tender kits. In the end, something was made up from brass tube and the flange which broke off a 2 mm pin-point bearing which I had been trying to use as an alternative.
    Of coarse, I got completely wrapped up in all this, in my determination to get it sorted, and was slightly horrified to discover it was the early hours of this morning when I finally finished.
    Despite the trials and tribulations and the rather late night, I have now got a fully functioning Jubilee ready to join the fleet.
    As a change, today I've been making a replacement tip for the spokes on one of my large umbrellas, which came to grief in the high winds and heavy rain at the Leamington Show, and making two sets of long fire irons to go on the tenders of the Jubilee and the Crab.
     
    Dave.
  8. Dave Holt
    Close on the heels of the BR Std Class 2 tank, I've now completed the finishing touches to my Fowler Class 3, 2-6-2 tank, which has remained almost finished for some years. The work required was the same as on the Standard, namely adding coal to the bunker and a crew in the cab, together with fixing the cab roof.
    Having said these are the finishing touches, I realise that I still need to add fire irons to the rests on top of the RH tank. This also applies to the Standard and to the tender of my Crab 2-6-0. Obviously, a fire iron manufacturing session is required shortly.
    Anyway, here are some photos of the loco as it currently stands.
     

     

     

     

     
    Dave.
  9. Dave Holt
    I thought it was about time I got back to some modelling. My arm/shoulder is still recovering, but i have sufficient movement to use small tools, etc., without over stressing it.
    So, I decided to fit the DCC chip as part of the finishing off process. This required separation of the chassis from the body, taking care not to damage the paint or weathering. That's not to say some minor touching up will be required by the time I've finished. The chip used is a Digitrax DZ126, the current nearest to the DZ123's I've tended to standardise on in all my recent locos. The (spare) lighting wires were cut off close to the encapsulation, just leaving the four traction related wires. Actual fitting was very easy as I had already fixed four copper-clad pads to the side of the gearbox, one each for the two pick-up connections and the motor terminals. In the temporary DC operation, short bridging wires linked the relevant pads to connect the pick-up wires direct to the motor. It only took moments to un-solder the bridging wires and connect the appropriate chip lead. The chip will just rest freely inside the boiler/smokebox when the loco is reassembled.
    The photo below shows the attached chip and chassis.
     

     
    Dave.
     
  10. Dave Holt
    Following a request, and for those who are interested in such detail, here a some further photos of the chassis components.
     
    First, the frames. Nothing particular to note really. Suspension is a centre rocking point for the front axle and twin beams for the centre and rear. Horn blocks are London Road Models cast items. Pickups bearing on the tops of the wheel treads, hidden behind the tanks and the valve gear.
     

     
    Three views of the keeper plate. This has now become permanently entangled with the brake gear since the front brake stretcher passes between the front sand pipes and their support brackets. Besides retaining the driving axle boxes in their horn guides, the keeper also carries the dummy springs, ash-pan and sand pipes. The four hair pin shaped wire thingies are the pony truck side control springs. It's fixed to the frames by a number of 14 BA screws.
     

     

     

     
    Dave.
  11. Dave Holt
    The chassis for my Caprotti Black 5 has now been painted and re-assembled, apart from fitting the motor and DCC chip. The latter will be a Digitrax DZ126, a tiny, fully encapsulated item, which will be held to the motor with some Bluetack.
    A couple of similar looking shots of the painted chassis are shown below:
     

     

     
    Close examination reveals one of the twin rear equalising beams and the single front one extending from the front coupled axle to the centre of the front bogie. The gearbox is an extended High Level driving the centre axle and prevented from rotating round the axle by the loose anchor point behind the rear axle. Various pipes can be seen between the frames, which match up with continuations either under the chassis or under the boiler/footplate unit.
    The cetre crank pin retainer on the side seen has not been painted as the lubricator drive return crank screws on, outboard of it.
    The body/footplate unit and tender body are off the be painted and lined next week, so it's all coming along quite well.
     
    Dave.
  12. Dave Holt
    Not too much progress with the layout or locos recently, although I have painted the cobbled area in the goods yard. I've been putting this off, fearing I'd wreck all the effort of hand scribing the setts. The initial results confirmed my fears had been well founded, but a couple more washes with very diluted black have blended the patches in a bit. I'm still not completely happy but hope it doesn't look too bad to others.
    In the lull, I've posed my Jubilee on the part of the layout currently erected, to illustrate a future operation. In the photos below, the Newton Heath shedded loco, in unusually clean condition, has arrive running tender first, with the stock for a sea-side excursion train and is seen in the process of running round its train, prior to departure......
     

     

     

     

     
    The loco will be going off to be weathered shortly.
     
    Dave.
  13. Dave Holt
    Contrary to my last blog entry, the sand pipes proved not to be the only outstanding work. I realised that I had not represented the drive to the mechanical lubricators. On the Caprottis, this takes the form of a triangular swing link driven by a return crank on the RH driving wheel. Whilst I had provided the mounting bracket under the foot plate, I hadn't really thought out how to represent the mechanism or how to actually fix it to the loco structure. This proved to be rather more testing than I would have wished! Unfortunately, the parts provided by the kit didn't replicate the full size version accurately enough for me, so whilst I did use the drive rod (which I had to lengthen), all the rest was scratch built.
    As with my BR Standard Caprotti, I made no attempt to make the final drive to the lubricators work, just the lower part of the swing link.
    My initial attempts were quite successful and I had the pivot mounting soldered to the loco bracket and the swing ling made up and pivoted in the mounting. The drive rod was stretched (by combining sections of two of the kit parts. Then things went horribly wrong and I nearly gave up.
    In trying to open out the bottom holes in the link, the whole assembly came adrift from the loco. So much for my soldering quality! Well, access for the iron tip was very restricted.
    Next, when trying to solder the pivot pin for the rod in the bottom of the swing link, I managed to not only solder the whole lot solid, but the swing link itself partially came apart. Half an hour cooling off was needed before I could face trying to rectify it all and recover the parts.
    Needless to say, I was rather more careful the second time.
    Anyway, after all that, I have managed to get it all on and working, giving a satisfying waggle of the link as the wheels go round.
    Here's a photo of the finished arrangement. If you look closely, you can just make out the splice in the drive rod near the swing link end.
     

     
    Still got those sand pipes to do. Then it's ready for painting, I think.
     
    Dave.
  14. Dave Holt
    Since my first post on this new loco, I've made some progress with the cylinders, lubricators and associated pipework.
    The Comet kit design incorporates the top part of the cylinders into the running plate etch with the cam boxes and reversing links mounted above. It is intended that the cylinders are attached to the chassis in the normal way. However, completed examples of the model I have seen have struggled to disguise the join line between the cylinders and cam boxes which does not exist in the real thing.
    I couldn't see why the whole cylinder/slide-bar assembly couldn't be permanently attached to the running plate mounting plate and become part of the body, providing the connecting rods can be removed from the crank-pins to facilitate spliting the chassis and body. That way, the joint line can be as unobtrusive as possible. This arrangement did present some cylinder alignment issues but I overcame these with a couple of simple jigs to ensure that the projected cylinder centre line passed through the axle centre of the driving wheels.
    Whilst access is fairly easy, I decided to fit the lubricators and complete their associated oil distribution and steam heater pipework at this stage. Normally, I wouldn't start to add this type of detail till much later in the build and after I've got the loco running but it's done now.
     
    Here we see three views of the lubricators and oil pipework. I use 0.2 mm wire for these. Still overscale but a lot finer than many people seem to use. The pipes to the left-hand cylinder and slide bar cross along the top of the frame spacer. On some of these locos, the pipes were clipped to the outside face of the front splasher. That would make lining of the splasher very tricky, so I found a suitable example (44741, a Longsight engine) which had them on the top, curved surface after it's 1952 overhaul.
    These shots also clearly show how the cylinders have been fixed to the running plate rather than the chassis.
     

     

     

     
    The cylinder lubricator (the forward one) has a steam heating supply to thin the sticky steam oil for ease of pumping. On these locos, this supply was taken from the steam lance cock on the RHS of the smoke-box. It can be seen making its way down and along the top edge of the saddle, then aling the footplate and over the splasher top to the front lubricator. To allow the boiler to be removed (for painting and lining), the pipe is split at the front of the reversing shaft bracket on the running plate.
     

     
    Finally, an overall loco shot showing my sketch diagram for the lubricator pipework. The routing was mainly gleaned from photos in the Wils Swan loco profile book for these locos. An invaluable source of information including copies of some of the key drawings.
     

     
    Dave.
  15. Dave Holt
    One of the problems I've created for myself is that the layout is being/has been wired in a way that means nothing can really be tested without the control panel being connected and so far I had not made any progress with this item. I've now made a start sing a panel case bought from Squires.
    I must say, it has a sort of 1950's Sci-Fi film laboratory (think Quatermass or Blob from Outer Space type of thing) look to it in my view. However, since the layout is set in the '50's, that might be quite appropriate.
    Progress to date has mainly been marking and drilling for the various switches and LED's and fitting the plug & socket (2 x 25) for the connections to the layout and 2 x 5 pin DIN sockets for the main DC and DCC controllers. The two large rotary switches select the main or yard controllers or DCC for the two track sections (main/platform line and loop/yard).
    The point and signal switches are set out like a signal box lever frame and have appropriately coloured levers.
    Still lots to do, but at least work is under way.
     

     
    Here's the panel with the lever frame and section selector switches fitted and holes drilled in the mimic diagram panel for an isolation switch and various LED indicators.
    Here are skectes of the two panels.
     

     

     
    Dave.
  16. Dave Holt
    I recently retrieved the final scenic base-board from my friend's workshop, primarily to check the space for the home/loop bracket signal and if there were any under board obstructions which might get in the way of the operating mechanism. Actually, there's loads of space, unlike some of the other signal locations on the next (station throat) board.
    I've taken the opportunity of having the board at home to lay the first section of the single track approach to the station. I'm happy with the alignment across the base-board joint and smooth curve achieved. Here's a couple of photos of the track in situ, one in each direction.
     
    First, looking towards the station throat point-work
     

     
    Then looking towards the rest of the world (or Greefield, at least)!
     

     
    The strange sloping structures are the foundations for a sloping lane which climbs up and crosses the track (actually located in Dobcross) and a connecting foot-path. The space between these features is filled with an interesting group of stone-built cottages. This arrangement is meant to hide the exit into the fiddle yard.
     
    Dave.
  17. Dave Holt
    Gosh, nearly 6 months since the last entry!
    Not a great deal of progress with the layout - although I have applied a base coat of colour to the trackwork on two of the boards and started to contemplate wiring up on the third board, That's the one with the main station throat pointwork, so represents more of a challenge than the two dealt with so far. There's nothing like thinking about a job to avoid actually having to do it!!!
    Anyway, I have been doing some modelling over the intervening period - some of it "cheque-book" modelling and some physical modelling! Inspired by the photo of a Greenfield to Llandudno holiday train on page 101of Larry Goddard's Delph to Oldham book (Foxline), I wanted to represent it on Delph as if it had in fact started it's journey on the branch. Larry has produced a rake of 6 coaches, the first four of which are the same diagrams as visible in the photo and the last two types of his choice. I've built the bogies as larry doesn't work in P4 and as a result the whole thing is still work-in-progress. The bogies are a mix of Dave Bradwell sprung units, where AJ couplings are required, and the new Brassmaster/Jim Smith-Wright compensated units (very quick and easy to assemble, I must say) for the remainder. Cosmetic side-frames are 247 Developments for welded type and MJT/Dart Castings for the rivetted version. I haven't made and fitted the AJ's, yet but the coach to coach couplings are Masokits types, which allow coupling by just pushing the vehicles together and which are very easily adjusted for length so the (sprung) buffer heads just touch.
    Painting of bogies and weathering still to do.
    The photos below show the assembled train (in the correct sequence per the photos) with my partially completed Crab at the head - again, as per the photo. Sorry about the poor quality of the photos, but lighting conditions are not the best and the use of flash seems to make them to stark and too much contrast.
     
    First, the re-creation of the published photo
     

     
    More detailed views of the various coaches
     

     

     

     
    Finally, a view fron the rear as the train departs Delph on its way to the sea-side.
     

     
    Dave.
  18. Dave Holt
    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!
  19. Dave Holt

    A bit more progress

    By Dave Holt,

    Still no actual track laid, but I am edging slowly towards it! To provide some strength to the track at board joints, and hopefully prevent rail end damage during assembly and disassembly of the layout, I'm fitting a couple pf ply sleepers where each track reaches the end of a board with brass panel pins driven into the board top rather than the usual rivets. This is now complete except for one end of one board. After that, I need to partially cover the turnout operating unit holes to just leave a slot for the actuating wires to pass through, locate the TOU's under the boards and then track laying can start. Here's 3 photos of recent progress.



     
    Dave.
  20. Dave Holt
    After the electrifying excitement of wiring the board and actually driving a loco up and down, it's back to the coal drops, plastic and solvent. Mmm...., does smell quite nice - no, not really! Anyway, the steps up the side of the retaining wall have been made and fixed in place. Unfortunately, these are a figment of my imagination because I could not find any information about how they actually looked. Still got the capping blocks to fit atop each side wall and create some wear on the front edge of each step. Still putting off trying to paint/crayon the retaining walls and pillars.
    Photos show the steps under construction and almost finished. They dont reach the board at the bottom because there is a 2 mm thick surface to go on the road and yard areas.
     

     

     

  21. Dave Holt
    Nothing very photogenic recently but some good progress has been made.
     
    I decided to break off from the coal drops whilst I pondered the access steps from the lower to upper levels. In the mean time, all the droppers have been soldered to the rails and these have been connected together, as dictated by the wiring diagram & schedule, by means of under-board bus rails (bare copper wire supported on brass screws) which run roughly under the track position. Later the busses will be connected to the tag strips at each end of the board. The inter-board connectors will also be connected to the tag strips.
     
    I'm intending to use a common return system to reduce the number of cables, but there's still quite a lot of wires, especially on the station board where the control panel will be located.
    I must say, the appearance/neatness of my wiring isn't in the same league as some of the other entries I've seen on RMweb recently. Definately no photos, please! - A case of out-of-sight; out-of-mind?
    Nethertheless, using temporary jumper leads I was able to power up the Tortoise and swith the point and also run a loco on every length of track on the board (the track over the coal drops will not be powered, as locos were not permitted, so there's no need). All very satisfactory and positive.
     
    Now it'sback to the coal drops or cosmetic chairs on the point.....
     
    Dave.
  22. Dave Holt
    Apologies to those who managed to find this update and request for help in the history during the recent posting problems, but here it is again. Better luck this time?
     
     
     
    A bit more progress with the coal drops, this week.
     
    For the first time since before Christmas, I've been able to access the workshop and trial fit the coal drop deck with the rails attached. Fortunately, the alignment with the track already fixed either end was very good, although a packing shim (.020" plasticard) was required at the LH end to get the top of the rails level at the joint. The trial fitting also allowed re-checking of some dimensions which affect the scenic part of the drops - the retaining walls. These photos show the deck in position.
     

     

     
    I've also cut the LH end stone retaining wall from Wills coarse stone sheet. This is shown below, with a photo of the real thing behind. I really could do with a bit of help here from someone who remembers the drops in working order.
    In the 1991 photo, there are obviously modern concrete steps leading from the coal yard area (then a car park - now a road/houses) up to the goods yard level, complete with a right-angle turn near the bottom. The capping stones on the upper part of the wall look original, so my questions are:
    - were there earth or stone steps originally, or just a steep path?
    - was the right-angle turn there or did the original just carry on straight down next to the wall to ground level?
    I have a copy of an old photo which shows some sort of access way up the side of the drops, but I can't make out if there were steps or not and the lower section is obscured.
    Any help answer these queies would be most gratefully received.
     
    Anyway, here's my effort so far.
     

     
    Finally, I've finished the wall at the RH end where the deck sat. This wall is split, with the inner section, directly under the deck, on the base-board which carries the drops and the outer section on the adjacent (station) board. Hopefully, the joint won't be too visible when the boards are assembled.
     

     
    This post seems to have dropped off the end, so please forgive me re-posting as I really would appreciate any help with the questions raised.
     
     
    Unfortunately, no one seems to remember any details of these drops, so I'll plough on with something "in the spirit of" rather than a scale model - which will fit in with my "model based on Delph", not an exact replica approach.
     
    I've now made the cosmetic brick support pillars which took the deck and divided the cells. The structural supports are MDF and built into the layout, as previously illustrated, so these are made from plastic sheet to replicate the bricks with stone block bearing pad inserts. Being white cards at present, the details don't show up too well in the photos, but these might give some idea of progress.

    Here's the deck balanced loosely on the 5 pillars which are more or less in the right positions. At this stage, the ends of the pillard had not had the brick card applied
     

    A closer shot of one end, where a bit more detail is visible
     

    Two of the pillars with the end faces completed.
     
    Next job is to paint (or crayon - see Barrowroad blog) to represent a sooty, coal dust encrusted condition. Help!!!!!
     
    Dave.
  23. Dave Holt
    Have laid the track across the coal drops for the layout. The deck beams are obeche strip spaced at 20 mm centre-lines. The track uses Exactoscale functional bridge chairs fixed to the wood using Plastic Weld solvent. For added security, there are brass locating pegs at three places along the length on which the chairs plug and the last two chair positions at the base-board joint are soldered to brass panel pins for strength. Had a minor setback when after all was fixed, I noticed I'd put one of the chairs on back-to-front, so the key was in the 4 foot! Luckily, it was on the rear track, so with a bit of scalpel work i managed to make the visible side look like an inner jaw and no-one will be able to see the lack of a key on the far side of the rail! I only found my mistake when I slid the track gauge along and it bumped over something!
     
    Final fixing will be left till I've added the decking, hand rails, etc and also done the cosmetic parts of the drops area and cell dividing walls/support pillars.
     

     
    View of the whole deck section with rails attached. The extension along the front edge supports the decking walk-way and hand rails.
  24. Dave Holt
    I'm getting there! All the track in the station area except that across the coal drops is now in place. Still to do is application of cosmetic chairs on the pointwork, but I'll leave that till after wiring and trial running - so some time off, yet.
    On the coal drops, the track support beams are made and I've mounted the functional supports at the cell devider pillars. These will be clad in brickwork and the three sides of the whole arrangement in coarse stone, prior to fixing the track structure in place. Well, that's the plan!
     
    Latest progress photos:-
     

     

     

  25. Dave Holt

    Delph push-pull trains

    By Dave Holt,

    I see Coachman has started this subject in his coach blog. Not to be outdone, here's a couple of photos of an ex-LNWR push-pull diagram M15 driving trailer with a BR conversion of an ex-LMS Period II open third and a Lees breadvan (Fowler 3MT 2-6-2 tank) in charge. By all accounts, the coaches might have done better on their own! The prototype photo is by H Casserley and the model photo by me. Can you spot which is which?
    The M15 is one of a series made for me by Coachman (and without which a realistic model of Delph would be virtually impossible), the Period II is by me from a modified Comet kit. Both beautifully painted by Coachman. Loco from a heavily modified Gibson kit, built by me and painted/lined by Ian Rathbone.
     

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