brian daniels

Female Chaffinch just can't get the hang of the perch to rest on as she just grabs one bit of sunflower heart and shes off again.

Little bit of snow in the garden so got out 37425 to plough on through it delivering the goods.

Had this ice spike appear overnight in our bird bath.

It's fine, I am painting it blue at the moment.

Just found I have this in 1978 of 20052 with a full set of sandboxes. Had to lighten it up a bit to see them!

Interesting picture of 20034 with inside sandboxes, here is one of mine in 1978 complete with tablet recess without the inside boxes. So I guess it had a re-bogie after plating the cab. So which had these bogies before 20034?

Very nice and good to see one in a different livery. By the way don't work me too hard, I have retired now!

They recently welded the bullhead rail into long lengths on the Cowley branch, one or two years ago and that's on concrete sleepers.

Whilst I am in the wagon mood I have dug out my Skytrex PCA's to finally add the etched walkways that I had done by Pete Harvey along time ago. Unfortunately I am one etch short, 5 out of 6 wagons done but it does leave one to show how it was originally. On wagon 10862 I got a set of M&M roller bearings to see if made much difference to the rolling of these. It does now roll away with a bit of wind behind it but these wagons are so heavy I am not sure it would make that much difference if I did all of them. New etched walkway and grab handles on tank side. I also picked out a few details on the solebars. I also added some JLTRT airpipes to represent the two pipe system as built. Changed the buffers aswell for Appleby ones. So there we go after painting the new bits and blending in the weathering again they are ready to go.

Warship is on hold for a bit until I get some rad fan etches from Pete Harvey to see if we can improve the top. So in the mean time I have doing a bit of C&W work. At Bristol I bought this pipe load from Skytrex to go in my pipe wagon. This M&M plate wagon had Slaters wheels in it that decided to shed it's tyres so I managed to get them out and replace them with Peartree ones. Am now trying to weather it a bit. And have re-painted this ABS mineral from dark early grey to late light grey along with re-transfering it. Again trying to weather/rust it up a bit but I must admit this is not mu forte .

I take it it had an orange glow just as it popped it's head above the horizon? To me it looked like any other full moon.

Those bottom lamp brackets basically need to be swapped over I recon so will have a go at that later. I was thinking if I could solder a middle support in or not, will have a go next week as I am away now and Bristol Sunday. Also note the seem under the headcode does not squeeze up fully so will try and sort that next week. This was a pre-production model so might be moulded a bit wonky in which case a bit of filler or something will have to go in there as I am sure it will show as it's yellow all over and not the join between two colours.

Had a go at converting a Heljan 42 to a North British 43. The rad grill on the roof was a Pete Harvey etch with three etches to solder together to raise it up. I did not think the mesh ontop looked quite right as it went over the extended walkways but looking at pictures now it looks like these were at a lower level. I re-used the Heljan mesh and cut their's and glued it lower in the extended walkways. After filling the exhaust holes I drilled new ones to go with some etches I found in mt spares box from a DJH Deltic I think. The tail lights are from the front of a pre-production JLTRT Clayton I had part built before JLTRT re-done it so I put this in the parts box for re-use one day. The etched shed plate backing on the bufferbeam is from a DJH 03. The moral of this loco is, don't ever throw anything away that you get left with from kits

Just put these on my Flickr site, hope you can work out whats what, just ask if lost. https://www.flickr.com/photos/brianews/albums/72157689641300352 but there are duel braked and air braked on there.

Did some weathering today starting with blending in the flange lubricator box on 37425. Then some light weathering on 37692. Don't seem to remember this loco very grubby as it only did sandite work. I have sprayed some cream around the bogie at No2 end to represent the sandite that got thrown up. It looks a bit rough but this is how I remember it after basically being sandblasted as it laid it on the rail head. And finally 20162 with ploughs.

Finished the backhead for the West Country. Hope it's right as I did not have any pictures to go by just the instructions in the kit.

As the Bristol show is looming I thought I better do these flange lubricator boxes on 37425 that I had 3D printed some time ago. There are a few .5 holes needed drilling but I still could not do all the pipe runs coming out as there just was not enough room. Think it looks the part but just wondering how well it will show when it's painted. I think some gentle weathering will be needed to highlight it. And this is what it's supposed to be.

Yes speedo not hooked up yet just waiting until I can get it to run right before hooking it up. Just twisted the cranks round, sorted.

Oh bu**er should have looked at my own pictures a bit closer. Never mind better to sort it out now rather when it's painted. That's another reason I haven't put those drain pipes on yet!

Thanks for reminding me Pete

I do have these funny turns now and again Steve. I have about a dozen steam locos at the moment and have a JLTRT 2251 to build in a draw. I will no doubt do some more as I like anything to be honest. Does look the part doesn't it Bob. I will give it another run on my friends layout next week to see if it shorts again.

Got a Heljan 20 last week so have been adding the snow plough and painted the buffer shanks silver.

I have done all I can on the loco until I am sure it runs ok. Ran it last week and a few shorts, especially the brake rodding behind the centre wheel so I cut it off as it could not be pushed back out of the way as it was up against the springs on the chassis. You can't see it's missing. Had a short on the front bogie wheel on the cylinder as well. And then a wheel came undone, don't you just love these Slaters wheels. I still need to add the cylinder drain pipes but that can wait until it runs ok. Also have the backhead to do.

Valve rod has been tweaked and is now a bit better. And I have found some 1.3mm copper wire that should make the water feed pipes better. All the valve gear is also now finished, just need to run it to see what falls off, shorts or locks up!

25239 and 25244 were also like this when ED allocated.