brossard

You will notice I changed the title to be more relevant to the way the discussion has morphed. I finished construction of 3 PD vans. Two of these were restorations while the third was a new build. A pair of D1929: This is the restored van, you can see the side is a bit warped due to overzealous application of glue (I was given this by a friend a lot of years ago) This is a new build. Restored D2026: I was given this too. It was red when first done, we know better now. I bought two of the Hornby models without realizing I had this. John

I didn't realise until I saw the recent pictures that I had ordered the full cab version. No matter, I want both anyway. John

Indeed service is still great. I got a packet yesterday and I only ordered a few days ago - normally I expect things to take a week to 10 days to get here. Dave will be missed. John

It's a shame Dave that I think I've built all the vehicles requiring truncated buffers that I need. Still, I'm sure this thread will inspire thousands to upgrade their GUVs and build some CCTs. Tonight, I thought I'd better turn my attention to the mundane topic of security bars. I made some frames from plastic strip and cyano'ed the wires. I'll paint these black. John

This has really tested my sanity but I think I'm wrassling it into shape. Here's a shot of the van with main parts dry fitted: This is the second I've got to this stage. Now we just need windows. I've made frames for the security bars and they're ready to go. John

For foul weather, the half cab locos had a tarpaulin that was rolled up on top of the roof. A nice detail to add. I found a picture: http://www.modelrailways.tv/7mm-scale-mainline.html Scroll down to 41708. John

Thanks Iain, glad to know my efforts are of benefit to others. Underframe and bogies are now black. The bolt heads can just be made out, very subtle effect. Once weathered I think they'll stand out a bit more. I painted the van body crimson lake this morning, so I'll let that dry overnight. John

Now that looks a little better cared for. That's a good clear picture of the end and, what do you know, one of the buffers is ahoo. John

Boy that has seen better days. The only one left? Gasp! Surely it should be restored. John

The question was raised about the height of the model, so I've checked as best I can: I removed some material from the bolster and from the unevenness of the bogies I have some more work to do. The bogies are so low that the wheel flanges were rubbing on the floor so I had to remove material. The drawing has the dimension from rail to buffer center as 3' 8" or somewhere between 14 and 15mm. That seems correct in the picture. The drawing has a height to the top of the side of 10' 7 3/8" or ~ 43mm. I make the model ~ 43.5mm so well within my tolerance. John

Just in case anyone is on the edge of their seat waiting for a progress report, I've ordered Shawplan LaserGlaze windows today. The van has been painted and I will be applying transfers shortly. John

Before painting the underframe black, I decided to have a go with my Archer bolt head transfers. There's some fairly prominent detail that the Lima u/f is lacking as well as the brass bits I added: The transfers are textured being made with resin I'm told. The jury is out as to whether these will prove to be a waste of time or not. John

Thanks for the info on grey panels. Simplified lining started in 1932 so I think I'm safe in not doing them then. John

Thanks all. I'll check the height question. John

It's best to keep ones mojo under control, mine has been known to go walkabout for weeks on end. Thanks for your interest iak, your wish is my command: I got the info to do these from an article by, who else, Bob Essery, in LMS Journal 31 on Palethorpes Sausage and Experimental Milk. There are some good excerpts of works drawing showing underframe details of 4 and 6 wheeled vans. I found these amazingly useful since underframe details are hard to come by. John

Thanks for those references Paul. I do have a question regarding those grey patches (for chalked messages?) on the doors. I've seen many BR liveried coaches with them and the Lima model has them too. When did LMS start putting grey patches? I'm sort of doing mid 30s. John

Thanks guys. The buffers on this vehicle only have their tops lopped off, or so the drawing shows. For CCTs, the tops and bottoms are truncated which I think is what Dave's are. The only clear picture I have is of a van in earlier days with Midland style lining and round buffers (E&J's LMS Coaches of course). Perhaps the buffer head diameter was increased later necessitating the crop? It wasn't difficult to modify the Comet buffer head, but it is a tad risky. Dave, I should have mentioned it, but the coupling hooks are from your range. I really like the integral back plate. You'll be hearing from me again. The split axle wheels are an indication of just how long I've had this thing. I thought I'd purged all such long ago, but they do seem to crop up from time to time. John

I was stunned to read that too. I used to use MT as a place to get just about everything until the range got reduced some years back. I've been using MT more recently though. I agree, there is no other place like MT - perhaps the business will be sold on. John

Thanks for getting back to me guys. Yes, I'm a numpty, the picture I referred to is a BR branded van. The letter is "N" not "M" and I intend for the van to be LMS, sorry if that wasn't clear. What this means is that I have no pictures of the LMS van at all. My instinct is to go with the branding from the Hornby D2026 van. I'm also just about finished restoring an old PD model of that too. I did a search last evening, both on here and the interweb in general, but this van seems to be a rare beast. Here's a picture of the detailed underframe which was about 80% of the work: The left one was scratch built because the underframe from the old model was too far gone after disassembly, the one on the right is the new kit. I used Bill Bedford sprung W irons and parts from the Mainly Trains brake etches. John

A little while ago, while looking for "quick" projects to do, I came across an old Parkside Dundas model of the subject van: The lettering seems to be in the right place at first glance (although poorly done and the wrong size) and in accordance with PDs instructions. However, I found a picture in Essery & Jenkinsons LMS Coaches that shows a van with the lettering on the RHS. I'm wondering if anyone can confirm the location of the lettering. This van has been torn down and rebuilt with a detailed underframe. In parallel, I've built a new from the packet CCT kit. Here's the state of van as we speak: It is ready for transfers as you can see. Thanks John

Thanks Mark, should have known - I've used a lot of the MJT compensated bogies. As I mentioned, I actually found a load of whitemetal bogies in a box of decaying PC coaches. John

I thought I'd give some attention to the roof next: It is a one piece moulding in clear plastic. The ribs are too prominent and the ventilators are anemic. I filed off the ventilators and filed down the ribs. The windows were removed as I hope to install something better. I then very carefully drilled holes and installed some whitemetal ventllators. I've no idea of their provenance, they were in a coach bits box. The roof was then primed. Having completed the construction of the underframe, I gave it and the bogies a coat of primer. I masked the couplings with plastiscene. Things always look so much better primed I think. John

Thanks Market65, it's great to give these old models a lease on life - provided the fundamentals are correct. You are right, the tops of the buffers will need to be chopped off.

Well, today was spent detailing the underframe. I got it done but was a trial in places: I tested the underframe on the track and it all works - amazing! There's a pair of vacuum cylinders and brake actuators. My rigging isn't great, but the idea is to give the impression that it's there. When I scrutinized the drawing I happened to notice that the pull rod from the LH cyclinder actuates the brakes on the RH bogie and, of course, vice versa. The dynamo can be seen and some strip of 1mm phosphor bronze to represent the belt. There's a battery box at the bottom and the pan for the voltage regulator can be seen at the top. I discovered that I had goofed when positioning the bogies and that they were 1mm too far in, fouling the truss. I've since pushed them out and it's all good now. Here's a side view: This is the battery box (Comet) side and there isn't a lot to see. The opposite side provides a more pleasing "busy" look to it all. Note the voltage regulator (Comet) sitting on its' pan and NOT centered. John

This is something I've been meaning to do for some while (along with a triplet of Bachmann LMS BGs). Ben Jones' article in the last BRM was the catalyst to look closely at this model and decide what to do. My reference is Historic Carriage Drawings, Vol 3, NPCS, by Peter Tatlow. The model: Quite attractive really and the body is accurate: Stripped to its' component parts: Those bogies are actually from the short Hornby LMS Stanier coach and have a wheelbase of 8'6". The wheels are Bachmann split axle - they went in the bin. You might guess I've had this model for a long time. It's time to convert to EM. Working from the ground up, I started with the bogies: Wheels are Bachmann reworked to EM spec. (...yes, yes, I've ordered some EM wheels). The etch is, to state the obvious, one of Bill Bedford's from Eileen's Emporium. I do like Bill's kits. Here's the first bogie assembled: This rolls very nicely with nary a twitch through the 36" rad. test turnout. Making up the second bogie and modifying the underframe to accept them: This assembly whizzes very nicely along the track. Next, I wanted to deal with couplings. I use scale head Kadee, which in the past have been attached to the bogie. This time I wanted the coupling on the body - under the bufferbeam alas - so that the bogie can do its' job without interference. This involved fitting buffers, coupling and modifying the bogie: You can see I've cut away the front beam of the bogie and added some extra struts. This worked great on the test track. So I did the other. Testing showed a good result. I then added cosmetic sides to the bogies. These are from Bachmann bogies: Tacked with cyano and reinforced with epoxy. Anyone know of good solderable cosmetic bogie sides? Comet don't list them separately on the site. I spent a fair bit of time gouging plastic out of the bearing cavity to get the sprung bearing carriers operating freely. Next I turned to the underframe. A lot has been done, but now I need to detail the center bit. First I removed some of the floor to give me more room to attach my gubbins. I had planned to reuse the plastic trussing (there's some nice bolt detail) but as I was filing, it failed. I decided to do something in brass. The 4mm drawing in the book gave me all the info I needed and I used some 1mm square tube and 2mm scrap strip: The center trusses come from a PC coach that disintegrated (actually the whole rake did). These were modified to suit the GUV. Trussing assembled and trial fitted. I don't know about you, but I'm impressed. Brass is such a wonderful material: By the way, does anyone know how the brake handwheel is rigged to the brakes? Now on to the brake detailing. John Edit: Forget about the solderable bogies. I just found a load of whitemetal bogies with those PC coaches I mentioned.