James Hilton

The prototype were a successful, albeit small class, long lived and geographically spread from Kent, across to South Wales, through the North West and even one at Lambton in the North East... This is Francis, at Astley Green in the North West, the last working example. This is number 19 at Aberaman colliery in South Wales. As part of the project we've done a fair amount of digging and will be sharing more history of the type and it's class members throughout the next few months.

Thanks both - yes an exciting new adventure for us, but one we've been planning for sometime. Expecting Engineering samples in early 2021... in the meantime, our kits and components remain a focus, we've some new things planned and a few releases to announce this side of Christmas.

We're excited to announce our first ready to run model in OO gauge... The Kerr Stuart Victory... The Kerr Stuart “Victory” locomotives were a class of 10 0-6-0t sourced by the Inland Waterways and Docks Department in 1917. Most saw service at various southern ports before being sold into industry after hostilities ended. Six examples went directly into colliery service, two to the Alexandra Docks Railway, one to the Brecon and Merthyr and one to Colonel Stephens's East Kent (also a coal hauler). A number survived in industrial service into the late 1960s, none were preserved. Our 1:76 scale '00' gauge model features a smooth powerful can motor, flywheel driven chassis with darkened RP25-110 profile wheels, highly detailed accurate body with seperately applied details and a NEXT18 DCC interface. It will safely negotiate a minimum R2 curve. Design for our model is complete and tooling work is underway. An engineering prototype is expected in early 2021. Visit the website, sign up to the newsletter and keep an eye on social media for more announcements. We're going to be opening pre-orders in the new year. It's going to be an amazing adventure, I hope you can join us both on it. If you've got questions or comments we'd love to hear from you!

It's 20th June 1978, the last full week of operation at Graig Merthyr colliery and our photographer has caught an anonymous Austerity one shed at shift change... The colouring of this photo has been adjusted on the iPhone to evoke some of the colours in Gordon Edgar's excellent book on Industrial Railways in Wales, where the caption above is paraphrased from (pg 50 for those who have a copy). Of course, this is actually a DJ Models (not the new EFE model) J94 I repainted as a more generic industrial example using Humbrol 131 and then some careful blended weathering and some real coal for a load... this is posed on my micro OO layout Pont-y-dulais, which is inspired but not a slavish copy of Ponturddulais in South Wales. It's a lovely little layout, and I snapped this today whilst waiting for weathering on the Hudson Hunslet's to dry before taking it for a little spin up and down the sidings... In the shed are a pair of Modelu coats hung up (great details in the range these days), I love these little touches that don't over do the cameo but bring a scene to life... this is another one of my firm beliefs, that although a locomotive looks better with a driver, I don't think layouts need cluttering up with them - suggestions of life are more effective in these smaller scales. One thing I was reflecting on as I took the photo, was how lucky I was to have been able to build something that was fulfilling and mindful during construction but now sits and forms part of my life every day. It would be easy to loose this feeling, in the yearning for something more expansive, but the accessibility of the layout, and the feelings and emotions it evokes for me are more valuable than I perhaps had realised, especially with the toll on my mental health with lock down, financial and family pressures. Model making, when you have the mental capacity, is a real tonic. I hope you're all well and perhaps can find some time for yourselves during the latest lock downs wherever you are in the world. More soon...

A dark navy blue with an orange black orange stripe of lining that went through and around the Sentinel plate seemed to be common early, with a plain sign written style shaded lettering on the sides of specified.

As you might have spotted, we industrials, and offering more than just locomotives kits we've another new product range to announce... CAPTION: James's model, a repainted and detailed Golden Valley / Oxford Rail Janus, with the new Yorkshire / BTH etched plates fitted. Steve has been working on some of the custom etch artwork he's produced over the years to create a range of 'in stock' locomotive name and works plate sets in etched brass. Custom etching is fantastic, but does come with a lead time, these sets will be available from stock with no waiting time, and there are three sets in the range so far with more to come... PIP-001 Yorkshire Engine 'Janus' (with BTH or AEI marking) etched plates £7ea PIP-002 Dowlais Iron Works Nº 40 "King George V" etched plate £12ea PIP-003 Peckett W4 Dodo etched plates £7ea View the whole Planet Industrials range currently available What we'd ask is that if you've got an industrial prototype in mind that we could include in this range, drop us an email (info@planetindustrials.co.uk) and leave a comment here - we can't produce everything but we'd like to expand the range beyond this initial offering.

Thanks Colin. We’re only talking standard gauge industrial here though! Spare a thought for me, every prototype means I need to build and buy all the parts myself too! I’m running out of space for them all!

Planet Industrials We industrials Steve (Stephen Fulljames) and I (James Hilton) formed Planet Industrials in late 2018 after the ExpoNG exhibition. We had worked together for many years producing a range of modern, easy to build narrow gauge kits combining a ready to run chassis with a new body formed of a 3D printed core with etched metal overlays. We had always been interested in industrials (more on that another time) and noticed that there didn’t seem to be anyone adopting our 'approach' to kit design in OO modelling... so the idea of a ‘toe in the water’ to see if there was interest in a kit with the same ethos led to the development of our Hibberd Planet. We’ve recently launched a new website alongside our Facebook page, and are very excited with a number of announcements to make in the coming weeks. For now, if you’re interested please do sign up to our newsletter (on the website) and take a look at our existing range available through the Narrow Planet marketplace. www.planetindustrials.co.uk If you’ve an interest for more, than read on… ________________________________________________________________________________________________ The story so far... PIL-001: Hibberd Planet 18SCW The first kit we produced to combine a ready to run chassis, 3D printed core with etched metal overlays was the Hibberd Planet. In this first kit we chose to use a tried and tested chassis, the Tenshodo motor bogie, which we secured a batch to allow us to offer a complete kit. A set of white metal cast weights were also developed and included to improve performance of the model. We released the kit at Warley in 2019 on the Narrow Planet stand with a lot of interest from the public and modelling press and have been excited to see it feature in the news and reviews pages of all the best British magazines. PIL-002A: Devonport Barclay In the weeks leading up to Warley, Steve and I had been chatting about ideas and I’d suggested we looked at the Devonport dockyard as they had some interesting motive power over the years. The book arrived the day Steve left for Warley and we poured over it in the bar the first evening, leading to plans to develop a conversion kit for the Hatton’s Barclay. This kit was developed in a much shorter time scale and was an exercise in reverse engineering the Hatton’s model to ensure the cab would fit in the same way, and re-use as many of the details and wire handrails as possible. In the run up to release we were able to secure a batch of models from Hatton’s to sell alongside the kit, so again when we released this kit in February 2020 we were able to offer a complete kit. PIL-002B: NCB Barclay During the development of the Devonport Barclay which was documented on my blog and Facebook we were encouraged to look at other cab conversions. The flatter profiled NCB style cab was the result, and has been a strong seller in the range. This kit was essentially a re-design of the Devonport cab, allowing us to bring it to market in March 2020 before the pandemic struck the United Kingdom. PIL-001B: Hibberd Planet with Shunter step The idea of taking one of our existing designs and re-working the parts to offer another variation is a good example of the benefits of today’s production methods. Our design work is done on CAD, and both 3D printed and etched in small batches. This allows us to offer variations fairly easily - a second version of the successful Hibberd Planet followed in April 2020 with the ‘shunters step’ variant, which also included a second etch to allow two styles of cab to be built from the same kit. As the lock-down slowed production other kits began to be developed in this period, some of these are still in gestation (more on that later). I began to build my own slices of industrial OO with Mollington Road and Pont-y-dulais and found inspiration in this modelling for products that were not readily available. Steve and I decided to offer a range of transfers, to allow our kits to be finished easily in industrial liveries - as well as sets to model rolling stock and industrial equipment that represent the wider industrial environment. I designed and prototyped the crossing gates and signage on Pont-y-dulais, and the etched wheel nut covers were needed for my own kit building projects from other industrial kits on the market when using Romford wheels. PIC-001: Industrial Transfers (white) / PIC-008: Industrial Crossing Set PIL-004: Peckett post-date I’ve been a fan of the Hornby W4 Peckett since they released the model, a real catalyst in industrial RTR modelling. However, I was never a fan of the Victorian era styling and decided to strip my own model down to see if a cab conversion might be possible… in the end the conversion kit goes further, also including new buffer beams and chimney. Steve and I have been blown away by demand for this kit, which has sold out of every batch we’ve made in less than a week! Yes, the model it produces is a hybrid and not a true W6, but it’s a close approximation using the available parts. The development of this kit has led to a further two models (more on that next). I mentioned earlier about the ethos behind our kits - they’re designed to encourage the beginner, someone new to kit building to take that first step, and with that in mind they’re designed to fit well, use simple tools and processes to assemble them following clearly illustrated instructions. I’ve had a hankering to take this one stage further and develop a simple to assemble, no solder, chassis design. This has been in development for about twelve months now and the result is a prototype that meets these criteria. It is a project that has meant we’ve had to invest in tooling up parts including bushes, pulleys and flywheels, bulk buy wheels and motors and go through a number of iterations in chassis design - I’m hoping the result will be worth it and we will have a product that encourages people to have a go at this first step into more complex kit design. Kits and products in development at this moment... PIL-001C: Flame proof Hibberd Planet The first application of this chassis will be our third version of the Hibberd Planet, representing a flame proof example. The chassis will allow the kit to feature scale diameter wheels, offering a 60:1 reduction with a coreless motor with flywheel driving through a belt drive to a lay-shaft with worm and wheel transmission to a pair of driven axles with all wheels picking up power. We’re sourcing the final components for this kit and hoping to have it available soon. PIL-002C: Pensnett Barclay A third style of Barclay cab conversion, this time including some replacement 3D printed buffers, will allow modellers to represent one of the later Barclay’s used at the Round Oak steel works in the West Midlands on the remains of the Earl of Dudley’s system. We will be releasing this kit shortly, and at the same time release a set of transfers to allow some of the system’s coal wagons to be modelled using suitable 5, 6 or 7 plank wagons. PIL-003: Clayton 25t The second prototype to use the chassis will be a much more modern design. Clayton built a pair of 25t shunters for the Devenport dockyard for use in refurbishing nuclear submarines, our kit again features 3D printed core and etched overlays but allows a modular assembly and full cab interior detailing. Thanks to Clayton for the support in providing photographs and drawings to allow this model to be developed. PIL-004B: Peckett cut-down cab Whilst developing the Peckett conversion I found a drawing for the Greenhithe class and wondered it it might be possible to cut down a Hornby W4 to allow a representation to be made using a RTR basis - the result, which initially was just a pet project for myself has gained so much of a following that we will be releasing this more complex conversion as a kit in the future. PIL-005: Ruston 165DE Initial research into another diesel kit looked at one of the last Ruston standard gauge shunter designed, the LLSH… on the way I stumbled upon both the LPSE/H and the late model sloped cab front 165DE. It struck me the wheels looked a lot like those on the Hornby Peckett, and a quick check of the scale drawings showed they shared a common wheel base. The slope fronted 165DE was selected and the Hornby W4 chassis reverse engineered to allow use of it’s mounting points for a replacement 3D printed core to which etched overlays could be added. The biggest challenge for the modeller with this kit will be removing the connecting rod and cylinders, I think it will make an ideal ‘second’ kit, building confidence and producing a unique model. The hope is this kit will be released in early 2021. So, that’s a brief (!!) over view of the journey so far, if you’ve got this far thanks for reading. We love hearing from you with your experiences of our kits and models, or ideas for future products or projects. Over time we will populate this section of RMWeb to include threads for each of our kits and products to allow you to engage with specific items and ask questions or make suggestions. In the meantime, sign up to the newsletter and we can’t wait to share more soon!

Good news - everything bar the Peckett cabs is back in stock at the Narrow Planet marketplace - the cabs should be another week or so... In the meantime, Steve and I have been working on a new website - just a holding page so far: https://planetindustrials.co.uk We love industrials, not just the locomotives but the wider railway environment. We've got a few ideas to include beyond the obvious pages on our kits and models, but would love to hear what you'd like to see - you can comment here, Facebook or get in touch via email.

To take us back to the layout, here is the ‘to be released’ cut down Peckett on shed... In terms of Pi, we should have the first Peckett cab conversion back in stock again soon, the next kit is actually the Pensnett cab for the Hattons Barclay, then it will be the cut down Peckett.

Thanks for the link, I had no idea Miniatures by Eric were still trading! I used to buy parts from their range in the 90s. I'm holding out hope for a set in the UK from a kind soul, happy to cover costs etc, otherwise buying an old model on eBay and stripping them off... I don't mind ordering parts from US/Canada when necessary, but the Athearn parts are, I believe, a better quality than these brass ones, and will plug straight on! There are a few 'dummy' SW1500s on eBay in the UK at the moment but the seller wants nearly £60 plus postage for them which puts them out of the question for now.

Hi both, neither eBay or Athearn have them available. I’ve lots of old retired models here I use for spares, but nothing with the right frames.

Hi all, one of my crazy ideas at the moment Is to attempt to model one of CN’s SWeeps, the SW1200 rebuilds with GP9 parts. I’ve a suitable donor chassis but it’s fitted with the AAR trucks and I can’t find replacements anywhere, I wondered if anyone could help me out this side of the pond?

More on my blog, and hopefully an article to come in one of the mags with some new photos!

That’s what I was thinking.., however it seems a popular choice, I’ve wondered about heavily modifying a Dapol RTR one on more than one occasion, an attractive prototype that’s well travelled.

I use all sorts, currently just the grey foam that comes in Twelve Commandments stock boxes - I chop it up into small hand sized pieces with a tapered end to a point. It works well - stolen from somewhere else, although I forget where!

Great news, congratulations Andy.

Thanks Simon - yes, it's a cute, if slightly ugly little prototype. I'm sure it would serve you well. Mike - not sure if we'll do a fourth Barclay cab, I've been sent details of this style before, I've pencilled it in for 2021. If our new cab, the Pensnett style one does well, then I'll look at it quicker... In the meantime, with the Peckett post-date out the door, the second version of this kit is going to be a little more involved. The prototype has been painted and weathered, and once I've added the new parts (cab rear hatch and modified step design) to the etch the parts will go into production... I took a few photos, some 'studio shots' to use in the publicity material. These cruel close ups show a few blemished in the weathered finish I need to revisit, but for now they're good enough to illustrate the instructions for the kit. I've finished my own model as 'Hornet' as the last standard gauge industrial steam engine working in the area, locally at Bersham, just south of Wrexham. There are differences, Hornet had a home made chimney (very characterful but damn ugly) a home made cut out on one side of the cab roof to increase door way headroom, and a hatch on the back of the cab (which I dislike)... in later years Hornet also sported wasp striped buffer beams but I chose to not represent these either as I already have locomotives in the fleet with this feature. The cab re-uses the original glazing for the rear spectacles, and glue-n-glaze has been used for the front windows (still slightly wet in these photos, hence why one appears 'white'). The weathering was applied by airbrush and then before it had dried was removed with a sponge dampened with white spirit. This left dirt in the corners and a gentle streaking. A second coat of dirt was then applied to soften the effect and blend things together. Once touch dry I dry brushed the edge of the foot plate and steps with gun-metal. Finally a photo showing Hornet with the non-cut down version of the kit - which shows that the roof line is lower even in the centre of the roof. There is another version I'm considering, there were example with a standard profile roof, dropped to this height. This meant the cab upper sheets were like Hornet, but the lower sheet was taller. This would be an easy mod, as it re-uses a lot of parts from both designs... perhaps one for 2021. In the meantime, if you'd like me to weather and re-finish your own model, any scale, any prototype, get in touch for personal proposal. For now, more soon...

A few weeks ago I finished off the Clayton 25t, well apart from a MU hose and some wipers, and the construction has allowed for some adjustments in production design, so the kit will be finalised in the coming weeks... I decided it would be nice to grab a shot or two on Mollington Road, rather than Pont-y-dulais. The inset track suits the prototype, and has more of a feel of the Devonport dockyard where these pair call their home. The model is finished with some custom transfers I designed based upon photos of the prototype after it's refurbishment in 2007. The glazing and transfers have really finished it off nicely. The wasp stripes aren't quite right, but were done by hand using 2mm wide masking tape cut using my usual technique of a glass sheet, metal rule and sharp blade. The couplings fitted are Smith's screw link - the prototype has a cover over these, and lower buffers for use in the dock-yard, these will be provided in the kit, but I've fitted the screw link. One thing I need to adjust and include is provision for an NEM mount, although the long buffers (as per prototype) may mean normal tension lock couplings aren't quite long enough. Anyhow, all that remains on my model are those few details and a very light touch weathering. More soon...

This makes interesting reading Corbs, you're a brave man splashing the cash on such an expensive machine, mind it's cheaper than a decent resin 3D printer!

The design is finished, I did have trouble with them on corners so need to do some further testing.

The Ruston 165DE is the latest kit in the Planet Industrials range that Steve and I are developing and was the result of an accidental realisation that the wheelbase of the Hornby W4 Peckett seemed to be a match to the prototype... The 165DE was available in both a flat front and later sloped front cab style. The former is available as a kit from Judith Edge. The 165 was also available in both 0-4-0 and 0-6-0 as well as hydraulic and electric drive. The hydraulic units had a jackshaft drive arrangement, whereas the electric did not - so to make things simple and minimise the work required on the Hornby donor chassis we've opted for just the DE model. It follows the usual Planet Industrials (EuroNG / NP / 6point5 / James Hilton!!) style of a 3D printed core, to which the chassis is firmly attached using the original mounting point combined with a fret of etched nickel silver parts that form the details and overlay. The body features re-cessed panels where the etched components sit, and goes together very easily. The prototype has thrown up a few things that need adjusting, as well as a beefier mesh on the front grill which didn't survive the etching process. I plan to work through these changes and update the etch artwork in October, so there is potential for a pre-Christmas release with this one... I've also got the parts to finish the Greenhithe Peckett and I've a ton of Peckett cabs for the standard kit here to work through and prepare for sale - more on that next week. In the meantime, more soon...

Built 2000, specifically for Devonport. Since then Clayton have built larger but visually similarly styled units for Cross Rail and Ford. I chose the smaller unit to start with as it appealed to me, and has a certain cuteness to it...

Yes, the Clayton will only be available complete with motor, belt drive, flywheel and wheels included.

Theoretically yes, although I haven’t tried it. There is space, but you may need to replace the Romford wheels for P4.