Buckjumper

The great thing about split axles is once they're done there's never any need to tweak or fiddle with them - if electrical pickup becomes erratic you know it can only be down to dirty wheels. The easiest thing is to ask Brian at ABC to build the gearboxes with insulated bearings which he does for no extra charge

I really like the fading you've achieved on the mink. This elusive red is something I've been thinking about for some time as I have a number of wagons to be painted, but I keep going back to Sidney Stone's contemporary articles on wagon and carriage construction (he worked for the GER, LSWR, Met. RC&W Co., Ashbury RC&I Co and eventually was Asst. Loco Works Manager for the GCR). In his writings he describes the properties of the various contemporary pigments, how they were collected, ground, mixed, etc, and he also comments on their various lightfast properties. I quote some pertinent passages below: That last bit is an important point. Interestingly, he goes on to say that: With regard to other reds available for industrial use he notes that: Pause for thought I think...

Looking superb Dave; the Dean goods were lovely machines. I'm intrigued that you've gone 3/4 of the way towards split axle pickup by using the excellent Slater's insulated hornguides, but then finished off with plungers. I've been using the same lathe-free method Steph Dale describes here for years with much success. In fact on tender locos with inside frames (or an inside sub-frame) I now keep the engine itself electrically dead and split axle pickup from the tender only. Another slight difference is that although I've never had the Araldite on the hornguides fail, I still take the belt and braces approach by putting through a 14BA CSH bolt through on the centre line of the ride height.

You're too modest. Yes, yours and John Dornom's are different styles and scales, but then Constable and Sisely's output were as chalk and cheese, nevertheless equally great to my eye.

This really is looking excellent. I know what both you and Pugs mean about photos; taking the lead from artists who do it with mirrors, I tend to take photos as I go and flip them on screen. It's amazing what suddenly jumps out at you as being not quite right, or even downright wrong. I foresee the end result becoming as inspiring as this...simply stunning.

Graham Beare has written several pieces for the Basilica Fields journal, four of which (so far!) deal with the GWR Gun Street sidings off the Metropolitan line at Artillery Lane and (the then) current prototypical practice - you might find some of the discussion interesting. They're spread over these two pages, and as is the way of Wordpress blogs you work backwards starting with the bottom entry on page 2 and working towards the top entry on page 1. http://basilicafields.wordpress.com/category/permanent-way/ http://basilicafields.wordpress.com/category/permanent-way/page/2/ Regarding rust erupting from paint; it's easier in the larger scales to replicate it, but can look overdone in 4mm. I was able to do this in 1/32, but have to really reign it in, even in 7mm or it looks wrong. In 4mm I think you'll have to be very careful and use sleight of hand to maybe give the impression it's happening rather than the full-on peeling.

I haven't built a Parkside kit for a while so knocking out a couple of Southern 12T covered vans to diagram 1428 was a nice change. In fact, to build something 'out of the box' without having to worry about springing or compensation or replacing the running gear with etched bits and pieces was a bit of a tonic. A gin & tonic. Much as I love to super-detail stuff, sometimes the big kid in me just wants to stick a plastic kit together and slap some paint on. What a bonus to be paid to do just that! The first to fall out of the camera is S47491 built in 1931 and seen in not a too grubby condition a few months after being repainted by the Nationalised railway. Taking the photo was a bit of fun too; the sky was heavy with lowering clouds, but beyond the front the sunset was a mix of yellow, orange, gold, turquoise ,blue, green and purple giving a cinematic, ethereal quality to the light. I set up and snapped away with some looooong exposures as fast as I dare with an eye on the sky above, waiting for the first drops - my main concern was the backscene getting drenched. When it came it was as if the cloud was rent in two - it hammered down, and I just made it to the safe and dry bolt-hole I call a workshop, though I could have done with a coracle and paddle to get me back up to the house... I'll post up the second van after the weekend - that one's in a different livery.

English idioms must cause no end of amusement and bemusement to anyone who learns it as a second language. And anyway, how did we get from 'some HR fish wagons might be nice' to 'you promised to build...'?

Thanks Pete & Mikkel. Yep, that HR fish wagon turned out rather well and it's one of my favourite wagon commissions to date. Turns out the Highland regularly transported fish and lobster to Billingsgate Market, so maybe I could justify a handful. I'll upload some more over the next day or so, but I hope that doesn't make me a fairweather friend...

Thanks Dave. I use Tamiya tape for all my masking boundaries, and always remove the tape shortly after painting before the enamel dries. The tape has the perfect tackiness and is easy to contour, but peels away easily. Once you've bought the dispensers the refills are as cheap as chips from places like ebay.

It's been a very busy few months in modelling and non-modelling terms, but now as things are calming down a little I've got time to download and sort through some of the photos stored on my camera from the various building and painting commissions. Jim McGeown of Connoisseur Models asked if I’d decorate a Queen Mary brake van he'd built in the EWS livery as a counterpoint to the predominantly 1940s/50s stock he already has on display on his exhibition stand. Following the brief, in this livery it’s not an exact copy of the prototype as ADS56299 had the verandah sandboxes removed and the lettering was of a stencilled pattern, but it gives a good impression of what comes in the kit. It was lots of fun to do such a disgustingly modern (and worryingly attractive) livery for a change, and Jim was so pleased with the result he handed me another to do, but this time in Southern brown and vermilion.

It would be easy enough to divert a few thousand volts down it...

Several photos I have here show with 100% certainty that the interiors of some open wagons in revenue-earning service of some pre-Group companies (specifically the GN and GE) were left unpainted. However, I have a note (tertiary source, so treat with due caution) that the LSW painted the interior of opens with 'one coat of lead paint' on release to traffic. My understanding gained from snippets of information so far generally suggests that many revenue earning general merchandise and mineral opens had unpainted interiors. For example, Cassell's Cyclopaedia of Mechanics (1900) describes in detail the process of painting a railway wagon, but only mentions the exterior. One reason suggested as to why this might be is that a painted interior would promote rather than hinder the planks rotting. On the outside of a wagon rain water would run down off the planks and fall away. However, the badly damaged and abraded paint on the interior of a wagon in service would allow rainwater to creep and settle behind it keeping the wood damp rather than allowing it to dry out. A second reason is the financial implication of almost doubling the not insignificant cost of painting a wagon, signwriting costs excepted. The cost of paint rocketed in both the mid-1880s (so much so that the GER, now long out of chancery and doing rather well thank you very much, ceased painting the whole of the ends of goods brakes vermilion, limiting the colour to the headstocks only) and then again during the Great War evidenced by repaired GE wagons being released back into traffic with new planking left unpainted on the exteriors. To balance the above and going against the grain (sorry!), Sidney Stone's 'Railway Carriages and Wagons' (1903) describes how wagons are 'plain painted' - the paint mixed was with boiled oil (which weathers better than raw oil) and he states that: "The principal work which may be comprised in plain painting are underframes, outside of roofs, floors, ironwork attachments and wagons throughout." Stone was Asst. Loco Works Mgr. of the GCR with quite a pedigree at the time his articles were published. Edit: shabby writing.

No chance of giving up the S7 David, but a little bucolic side venture with one or two turnouts and a K9 set in the 1880s...it's a bit tempting!

You know how to twist the knife. OK, yes please PM me the more up to date list. Very interesting photo. I wonder what 1900 was doing over at Neasden.

Cor, you're a flatterer, Missy! Actually I'd be really up for it, but time is the current enemy as I'm committed to have an layout built for the ScaleSeven Group's Challenge 33 by October next year. I've got a pile of bits for both an S Scale and S132 projects, but if inspiration hit hard enough a 2mm project could easily leapfrog both of those. Seeing Saxted again stirs the waters that's for sure, and I've just seen David Eveleigh's link from the 2mm Soc site. His etches for a GER K9 loco and various carriages/NPCS are all a bit tempting.

Ha, some chance! The larger the scale the more detail you have to add...for those of us working to finer standards anyway

Yep, I'd agree with that in general, but I was chatting to some fellow 7mm scale modellers at a Gauge 0 Guild trade show last weekend and we were saying how much some of the 2mm photos we've seen (just to embarrass him, Jerry's name was one that came up) could easily be taken for P4.

My comments about Saxted are on its thread, but Ray's locos were superb. He only had the G53 tram, the Y14 and the Little Sharpie 2-4-0 when I saw the layout in 1997. Their running quality was impeccable, but look at the neatness of the lining on the Bromley Single. What you ladies and gents working in 2mm achieve never ceases to amaze me.

Great photo, but I'd be slightly cautious of jumping to conclusions either way. The high contrast of earlier emulsions still being used at this time could 'white out' - evidenced by the roads and all those shop front awnings (I betcha not all of them were white!). And what about that field in the top right corner? I'd also be interested to know what percentage of the GW wagon fleet were shopped each year then work that against the percentage of vans showing white roofs. Not scientific by any means, but might make an interesting read. Philip Millard of the LNWR Soc. has on occasion pointed out the high proportion of vans in photos, even weathered ones, displaying white roofs. Does this mean van roofs were re-leaded between repaints or is it those contrasty emulsions again? Curly Lawrence's autobiography records the roofs of LB&SCR locos were definitely re-whitened by 'fassers' - the army of cleaning lads on shed at regular intervals to reflect the heat of the sun. Could the same have happened to vans carrying perishables? No answers, just questions for the pot

I've been looking forward to seeing where you were taking this ever since you first proposed it. I never knew Farthing was so big off stage - all these years I imagined it to be nice peaceful little hamlet (did you see what I did there?) but instead it's a walloping great market town saturated with steel rail. And what a photo you've posted there with the Sou'Western sheeted open to the right and that lovely Sou'Eastern open to the left, that well-stacked pile of coal and the Pooley weighbridge. What on earth is that sheeted thing behind the loading gauge - it looks like a house made of boxes or baskets!

Going back to the pre-Group period, the 1891 GER Appendix to the WTT only refers to pilot engines assisting. These snippets might be of interest.

He has indeed! The GER Yeast & Parcels, Meat & Fruit and Bullion Van kits will complement the D&S Sundry Vans as they're all based on the same basic design with (some significant) detail differences.