Buckjumper

Swindon obviously didn't have the Atkins, Tourett (et al) bible to hand at the time...

Very good! The tree helps disguise the hole in the sky very well. Remember that private sidings were invariably gated; a short run of fencing either side with an (operable) gate that swings back towards the loco shed would add to the ruse. +1 for the double arch bridge. It works as an excellent view block to the fiddle yard on layouts like Llanastr and . (time index 1.38 shows this perfectly).

Lovely variation in the weathering Tim. I particularly like the cleaned windows (rubbed with a sleeve!) on the ex-horsebox and the patches in the grime which have been worn away around the nether regions of doors and drop lights on the box and BG by the little people at work.

Hi Dave Yes I agree, and wouldn't want to denigrate the brand; WEP kits are lovely things to build - a couple of my most recent ones can be found here and here - but I completely understand that getting that second fold square is potentially an issue. I've seen some kits for outside framed vans build the framing up with multiple laminates, though that takes a lot of clamping with heat sinks to prevent distortion, and there's an awful lot of filing to make good the edges. Adrian

Fab. Jim's kits are lovely to build. He's said on more than one occasion that he prefers to draw the artwork for wagons rather than locos, so I wonder if we should raise a petition for him to produce an outside-framed covered van? I've got one of those WEP AA16 outside framed TOADs in the 'to do' pile. Interesting comments, as like Connoisseur kits, WEP kits usually to go together very well. So thanks for the tip about square brass tube which I'll bear in mind if it goes all pear-shaped. The figures are nicely painted too.

Dave, Very much like the improvements. Debs of this parish produces a number of 31.x mm gauges which may be of interest.

Nice plan! Two things spring to mind, one practical, one visual; bearing in mind the overall desirable length you've quoted, and the scale couplings on your models, it's worth ensuring that you are able to reach everywhere you need to as the layout is quite wide compared to its length. Worth also checking clearances in the loop too. Second thing is you might want to consider some kind of view block where the private siding disappears off stage. The curved nature of the backscene/proscenium arch helps enormously, but a small building or a tree will draw the eye of a viewer standing front centre away from the visible hole in the sky. And yes to installing a trap protecting the main line from the loop and two front sidings. BTW, you know how long those lovely locos of yours took to build, line and paint? That's how long it'll take to build a weeping willow to the same standard. It'll be worth it though!

Thanks - I'll be ordering sets of lamps from Laurie. Yes, all the Metro (and 633) locos running on the circle had open cabs, so mine will be too. This is the 633 and this is one of the Metros I'll be building for the layout. I need a Large Metro alongside, but there's no decent kit, so I may have to bash another Roxey one to get what I want.

Very nice yet again! I have a pair of these kits to build for Basilica Fields, but they will both have condensing apparatus for Middle Circle workings. Whose lamps have you used?

Entering (and winning) the scratchbuilt loco competition with your effort produced from etchings drawn by yourself, a CNC milled gearbox and wheel centres (again, by yourself) and rapid prototyped boiler fittings and buffer castings (designed in TurboCad....again by yourself). Of course, the entry which should have won (because it was hewn from brass sheet with a piercing saw) utilised bought-in wheels, gearbox, buffer castings and boiler fittings. Oh, sorry...'how to get lynched at a model railway show' - I thought it said 'how to get lynched on certain threads on RMweb'...

Until the mid-1880s, the general merchandise wagons of the Great Eastern Railway had high rounded ends (‘half-moons’ in GE parlance) intended to help support sheets to protect goods in transit from inclement weather. Several thousand examples were built fr0m the 1850s (under the antecedent Eastern Counties Railways) onwards , and by 1878 accounted for 58% of stock owned by the GER. Over the years new batches were given progressively modern features which then cascaded down to earlier builds as they came into works for examination or repair. All were built with side doors, most had outside timber framing, and individual angle irons held the corners together. Later builds had conventional corner plates with the wooden timber framing, but the final batches incorporated outside iron diagonal bracing and knees to which the sides were secured. Early examples had no brakes until the 1870s when single-side wooden brakes with one lever acting on two wheels were introduced. These were gradually replaced from the mid-1880s onwards with iron brake blocks . During the 1870s self-contained sprung buffers gradually replaced dead buffers, but from the early 1880s standard short buffer guides were fitted to new builds. Both of these types were bolted to square wooden packing pieces to increase their length to 1? 7?. From the early 1880s running efficiency was improved by fitting Worsdell’s Type A grease axleboxes. The livery was standard Great Eastern slate grey (Humbrol 67 or Phoenix Precision P.505 for modellers). Lettering was hand painted in white but stencilled on older wagons as per the photographs... [This is an extract of the latest entry on my external Basilica Field journal. Click here to read the full entry.] Click here to access the full journal

For small areas that need touching up and filling I use a car body knifing putty from Halfords, though I always leave it 48 hrs before sanding back. There must be something similar in the auto shops in Brazil.

For me this was the classic 4mm layout of the early-mid-80s, impressive, inspirational and aspirational all at once.

No; soon Callow Lane will be re-designated Eastern Region and we'll be hearing some far-fetched reason for running a (very lovely looking) Flying Banana.

Nope - sleepers and timbers ranged from very dark brown when new and freshly creosoted under pressure, to light silvery grey when old. Old in pre-Grouping terms being 16 - 20 years on running lines, depending on the company, though sidings could have sleepers a lot older. Your best point of reference are telegraph poles which are also pressure-treated and disply a wide range of colours as they age. What a big difference between these tracks and those in The Bay! Perhaps once the builders have the goods shed up and running the Superintendent of the Line will send a PW train to the station?

Just think; a Class 16 along with the Class 15 you're being ever so coy about, keep the the Waggonbascher, add a Toffeeapple and a 105 and you'd have that East Anglian layout you've been subconsciously yearning for since RMweb 1.5...

Picking up the current baton...to a poorly running Green Wet & Rusty layout; 'Was that loco designed by G.J. Touchwood?' Or the ubiquitous Bullied...

By all means keep the loco bright and clean while you need to solder, and a good scrub to remove all grease and acid deposits before painting is necessary, but tarnish doesn't affect the paint keying to the metal, in fact some painters I know allow the metal to tarnish before painting as they believe it keys better! Good luck with the Ivatt. I believe the College 4MT was the root cause of baldness among several modellers, and that there are several workshop walls with the remains of 4MTs still buried in the plaster, having impacted at great velocity... Certainly some of the Shedmaster wagon kits were ex-Jidenco, so the well tank could be too.

I haven't got either of those magazines Graham, though I will be getting BRM for the Nunstanton piece.

David, Thanks for your input, I've gone back and reread the discussion on your blog. I now know where I saw the information on a study attempting to differentiate between red and black on these emulsions! I'm expecting some more info in my inbox sometime next week, so once I've digested that I'll post it up.

Mikkel, Thank you, but I'm a bit of a bodger when it comes to photography. Thank gawd for digital or I'd be well and truly stuffed. All my presentable shots have been taken with a Canon 300D which is now getting on a bit in digital terms, but I do utilise two necessary extras - a Manforotto tripod and a remote switch. I've yet to get a decent shot with artificial light, even bright daylight bulbs and that worries me when it comes to taking future shots of Basilica Fields. I guess I'll be digging deep for some decent floods. Back to liveries; you've made some interesting points. There were a range of photographic emulsions on offer at the time, and yes, they were red blind, but - and it's a big but - not all exhibited the same properties. Going back to matters Great Eastern as I can at least speak with some authority without putting my foot in it, it is almost impossible to see the vermilion lining on +99% of all images which isn't too much of a problem on the ultramarine livery as one can see the blue and black border, but in the past it has caused much consternation with those locos painted black. Both Adams and Bromley's black locos had red lining, and after 1890 all goods engines were painted black. An unofficial painting procedure has been handed down by the photographer and ex-GER employee Ken Nunn, and because of that one document it was long assumed that all black goods engines from 1890 were lined red in the same style as the blue passenger locos, but this lining couldn't be seen on the emulsions of the period. Only relatively recently have we come to understand, from other contemporary sources, that the GER infact pulled a fast one and lined only the lowliest of four-coupled shunters, and all other goods and shunting engines were plain black and unlined. Here's an example of the difficulties encountered. This class of downright ugly ducklings was the first mogul (2-6-0) not only on the GE, but in the UK, and was painted black, lined red, and the cab side number plates were vermilion. See how difficult it is? Back to Slinn's comments about black lettering; I simply don't know enough about the GW, or have the resources to hand to make too many bold statements. I believe a study was conducted to see if the eye can differentiate between red and black on these old emulsions, and the consensus was a resounding 'No', but I don't know if it was particularly scientific in its execution, and I think there is a lot to be said for gut feeling. No. 59972 appears *to me* to have red characters, and both the running number and small GWR appear to be darker. I agree, this may well be down to the photographer touching up the lettering - ye olde photoshoppe! I hadn't made a connection with this practice possibly giving rise to the theory of black lettering, but that seems like a distinct possibility to me. Thanks for your considered thoughts - they are precisely what I had hoped for.

And it's an awful lot of lettering! I don't envy you doing it in 2mm either - even in 7mm it had its moments.

Don't worry, as a Great Eastern modeller it's taken me a long time to get handle on the Great Western mindset. However, by the time this mini series is over all should be clear. I hope...

A round dozen split between X1 and all three variants of X2. X3 are not anticipated at this time. Few, if any will be in post-1904 livery.