Waverley West

Thanks! They are actually in the process of swinging to the left over a point and heading past and behind the HST, so there was no risk of collision. It's not very clear from the photo though, so I can see why you thought they were heading straight for it!

I just meant 26002 and 26008 go everywhere together on the layout. But no, 26008 wasn't fitted with slow-speed control. Having to have 26002 at the front of the train at all times would be time-consuming as regards colliery/discharge point marshalling. I have heard that drivers didn't actually like using the slow-speed equipment much, as it was quite jerky. Some of them at least preferred manual control for a smoother journey through loading/discharge bays.

Hi folks, Just thought I'd post some piccies of the latest releases from the Waverley West Works - Coal sector 26002 and 26008, which seem to go everywhere together, currently hauling the layout's MGR HAA rake.. 26002 was chosen as it has round buffers and is otherwise identical to the original Heljan donor loco 26008 as far as I can see. 26008 was kept un-renumbered. They have both been weathered to a work-stained, but not too dirty state, which 26s in this livery often seemed to be in. So, without further ado, here are some shots of the pair on the MGR rake passing through Princes Street Gardens and then Waverley... Currently on the workbench are Large Logo 37417, which is awaiting final buffer beam detailing, and an InterCity Swallow DVT. Hope to be back soon with another update. Happy Modelling! Dave

I believe even SLW (surprisingly I would say) opted to illuminate both tail lights on their 24 just because they expected so many frustrated customers contacting them about only one of the tail lights being illuminated. I don't know whether the same can be said for other manufacturers, but it's certainly possible. Good news about the imminent arrival of the new 47s though.

Hi Alasdair, Now that you point it out, yes, 40159 had had its MU jumpers removed by the time of the main photo I used when weathering the loco (1980). I have seen a photo of them fitted to the loco while it had domino headcodes though, so I think I'll leave them in place, mainly because they add a bit of colour and interest to the bogie frames. Cheers Dave

Yes, of course! ...and a fraction of the size of Hornby's too. I used to use 1000uF capacitors just like Hornby's. Never failed to hide them in the vestibule/toilet area though.

Yes, agreed, the lighting units are a bonus, as I would have wanted to fit some anyway. It's just the thought of having to try and move the existing capacitor or fit a new one in each of the coaches, all for the sake of a bit more care and attention from Hornby. And yes, I'm sure someone will come up with a user guide sooner or later, but experiences so far seem to suggest it isn't easy, meaning that damage could be a possibility.

Although I initially used to use large capacitors (like the ones Hornby are using) placed in the toilet/vestibule of stock, I now tend to use ESU's power packs: https://www.coastaldcc.co.uk/products/esu/led-lighting-strip-powerpack They are 0.22F (220uf) and I've never seen any flicker with them whatsoever, even with dirty coach wheels, So, yes, that would suggest Hornby's 1000uF is over the top. Capacitors like the ones Hornby is using will cost a few pence, while the ESU power packs are a few quid each (when not bought commercially anyway). Like I say, a ha'penny-worth of tar on a train costing hundreds of pounds. I find it hard to believe even the large capacitors that Hornby are using can't be concealed in the vestibule or toilet area though.

Glad to hear you're pleased with them. I must admit I have been completely underwhelmed by the photos of the capacitors and light bleed (and I say that having fitted many of my coaches with both capacitors and light bars without any visual intrusion). I can't believe Hornby had no option but to sign off that design with an enormous and highly visible capacitor blocking one window. They had the same slap-dash "it'll do" approach to the under-length lights they fitted to their Mk 3s. They just do not seem to devote the same level of care and attention to "modern" stock that they give to steam era locos and coaches. I was getting to the point where I was considering (still am to some extent) cancelling my order for what, for me, is a marginal and expensive luxury purchase. The thought of not easily being able to open them up to rectify the issue and fit passengers doesn't help either. Still having one of the original Hornby APTs from the 70s though, I really do not want to cancel my order, as I never thought I would see one built to modern standards and I remember seeing the prototype in action, albeit only briefly. My overall impression from what I have seen of it so far is that it's an impressive model spoilt for the proverbial ha'penny-worth of tar.

Hee hee, I know what you're saying. It was tempting to go to town on it. 40159's condition was actually modelled based on a really good photo of it at Eastfield in 1980 in the book "Looking back at Class 40s". Dirty roof, fairly clean sides. It is probably actually a bit dirtier than it looks in the photos, as it has had a dirty wash down the sides. It's always easier to add more weathering than to remove it though, so it may yet go back to the works. As and when Bachmann release a standard disc headcode version, I may well go to town on one of those. On a previous 40 (now sold), I had a nice oil stain down the side, which I thought looked really good. It actually covered up a glue mark on the body side, but over time I forgot about that bit. Funny how it was incredibly annoying at the time I got glue on the loco, but over time I really grew to like that stain! Perhaps I should do one on 40159 too. Cheers Dave

A few more piccies of 40159... Finally, to finish off for now, here are a few other piccies of the depot taken during a recent running session. Hope to be back soon with some pics of the pair of Coal sector 26s, as they are nearing completion now. Cheers for now, Dave

Hi folks, Well, six weeks since my last update, so not as bad as last time. I've been pretty busy on the traction front recently. You wait ages for new locos on WW and then no fewer than five come along at once. The new additions cover the full timespan of Waverley West, including a centre headcode 40, two Railfreight 20s and two sector 60s. Anyway, without further ado, here are the new releases from the Waverley West Works: First up are two Railfreight-liveried 20s, based on Bachmann's new release. Although Bachmann's chosen 20227 was a Haymarket loco and therefore perfect for WW, I thought the choice a bit strange, as I was unable to find any other Railfreight 20 which was fitted with a hi-intensity headlight while in BR service, which led to a renumbering headache. I wanted a pair of the locos, so in the end I opted for 20132, which was fitted with a headlight sometime after privatisation as far as I can tell from my research. I found it a bit surprising that no other Railfreight 20 was fitted with a high-intensity light, given that twenty class 20s were painted in this livery and presumably lived on longer as a result. Anyway, 20132 is always the train loco in my pairing, so you don't really see the headlight. So, rule 1 applies and I've let myself off the hook. Here are some photos of the pair, which are currently powering one of WW's Speedlink rakes, passing through Princes St Gardens and on through Waverley... I opted for a "workaday" appearance for this pair. Not particularly clean, not particularly dirty. The next new arrival is Petroleum-liveried 60065 Kinder Low. This ended up being a complete respray due to Hornby's complete hash of a paint job on the original loco (60062 Samuel Johnson). Despite their almost exclusive use on freight, 60s always seemed to be pretty clean, so that is how I've portrayed this one. The loco is currently being used on my rake of TEAs, one of the longest rakes on the layout (10 bogies), which it pulls with ease (after the usual major modifications to the Hornby close-coupling mechanism anyway). The fourth new loco is Coal sector 60078 Stac Pollaidh, which will mainly be used on one of the layout's coal rakes. This was also a complete respray for the same reasons as above. Here it is pootling about the station light engine... The fifth and final arrival for now is Banger Blue 40159, which will replace split headcode 40142, which will be sold. My memories of 40s, especially those in Scotland, don't really include the split headcode version, so I had been waiting for the centre headcode version from Bachmann. Again, this one is fairly clean, although the roof is dirty... Well, I seem to have reached my 10 Mb limit for this post, so I'll sign off from this one. More to follow though! I've been having a bit of a clear-out of my loco projects, as looking at my stock boxes, it was clear many projects were never going to see the light of day for various reasons (lack of time, cost of fitting sound chips, obsolescence, etc. etc.). So, I decided to sell off quite a few locos and use the proceeds to fund sound chips for locos which had been sitting in their boxes for too long. So far, this approach has been paying dividends, with the above locos now making it to the layout at last and a few other locos also on the bench, including two Coal sector 26s, Large Logo 37417 and (please don't tell anyone) an InterCity 90 and DVT combination. The latter are not a sign that electrification of WW has been authorised (extremely unlikely), just that I happen to like them! They will be used on both drags and as an electric without any OHLE when no one's watching. Rule 1 again. Hope to be back soon with those other photos. Cheers for now. Happy modelling! Dave

Or, an alternative viewpoint: Great, no CCMs! Having just spent a considerable amount of time on two Hornby Class 60s filing the close-coupling mechanisms down to get them to work reliably, it's good to know I won't have to do the same on the new Bachmann 47s. Unless and until manufacturers can come up with a truly reliable CCM on locos, I'm quite happy to carry on with couplings on bogies which virtually always work flawlessly. In my experience, Hornby's CCMs are a real pain and a country mile off being reliable on my freight rakes (50s, 56s, 60s and even 31s). SLW's version seems to work pretty well, but I don't really use my SLW 24s to pull the long rakes that my Hornby and other locos are used on.

I've been informed by Mike Parsons of C&M Models that 47711 (along with all other as yet unreleased 47s) will be the latest tooling. I've not heard anything about the headlight situation, but I'd be surprised if Bachmann slapped a standard high intensity headlight on it, after all the effort they've gone to with their latest version.

See the cross-country service arriving from around 6.30 mins in this video: It appears to show a very grubby InterCity Swallow RFB at the head of a rake of InterCity a/c Mk 2s (admittedly mostly/all Mk 2d's I think) all with either original I/C branding or no branding at all. This suggests the RFBs were some of the first coaches to receive the Swallow branding, hence also the lack of door locking lights?

More fascinating photos, Dave. Dreadful weathering of that power car in C8179 though. Ridiculously overdone and just smeared on/off. As they say on e-bay - L@@K PRO-WEATHERED.

Thanks for the explanations, RBE, much appreciated. I wouldn't mind removing the odd pipe or other detail part to get a loco round a 2nd radius curve and have done so on occasions. My concerns were more based around the possibility of having to make major modifications (to bogie pivots, for example), but that doesn't seem to be applicable here. That's good to hear.

37418 enters Edinburgh Waverley with a Speedlink service... Much of the rake seems to be made up of china clay bogie wagons... an OBA... a BBA steel wagon... ...and tail-ended by three china clay slurry tanks...

I have to agree. I think it would apply to a lot of other modellers too, myself included. There isn't a circuit on my layout which doesn't include 2nd radius curves and I wouldn't want to have to severely restrict where a loco can go on my layout even if there was. I would strongly advise making sure it can go round 2nd radius curves comfortably. It would certainly count me out if it can't, which would be a great shame. I like my Hornby 56s (aside from those terrible close-couplings), so any competing product is going to have to be good.

Thanks! Nope, no airbrush was troubled for that job. Much of my weathering is done without an airbrush.

That's very kind, Rich, but please be inspired, rather than dismayed. That was my intention. The weathering of the wagon really wasn't difficult or complicated. It mainly consisted of spraying the wagon with Railmatch enamel aerosols - Sleeper Grime, Frame Dirt, Roof Dirt and Weathered Black. This was then mostly wiped off with kitchen roll, leaving dirt in crevices and wherever it was supposed to be. Always make sure you wipe vertically to mimic the vertical streaking of weathering. This normally produces a good weathering finish in itself, but for this wagon, I wanted to replicate the white staining left by the china clay these wagons carry. To do this, all I did was leave the wagon to properly dry for a day or two and then apply a thin enamel wash of white over the wagon. Leave to dry and, if dissatisfied, simply wipe it off with thinners or wet it with more wash and repeat until you are satisfied. The beauty of enamels is that you get plenty of time to work the paint and it can just be wiped off to start again if you're not happy with the finish. With white washes in particular, it's best to wait until the wash is dry before declaring yourself happy with the finish, as the final appearance is often very different once the wash is dry (much lighter normally). The only potential pitfall is that enamels can dissolve certain tampo printing on models, particularly Bachmann's more recent models. The worst thing that can happen then though is that you have to buy transfers to replace what was there before. My golden rule is that, as long as you protect the glazing of locos and coaching stock either with masking tape or by removing it, there isn't a lot that can't be undone and simply done again, so give it a try! Pick a cheap item of rolling stock to start with and experiment. Hope that helps! Cheers Dave

Having just added silver buffer shanks to my HAA rake and various other rakes, I think this makes a big difference to their appearance, as it's a very prominent feature of many wagons. It's not a difficult job to add them yourself though of course.

A care-worn Traffic Services Ltd polybulk passes through Edinburgh Waverley in a Speedlink rake in the late '80s...

Hi folks, Well, I see my last update was back in April, so I guess it's more than about time I posted another one. Life has been busy as usual these past few months and my older daughter is about to head off to uni this weekend, so that's going to be a big change for the WW clan. I have managed to keep fairly busy on the modelling front though too, with a number of projects being kept on the go through five minutes here and five minutes there, which I find is a good way of keeping my mojo up. Anyway, without further ado, here are some of the projects I've been working on. First up is the addition of a second Mk 3 TF to each of my three HST sets, one blue-grey, one original InterCity and one InterCity Swallow. This wasn't as easy as I had expected, as each rake had been completely resprayed and they each had their own subtleties as regards the colours I used for the seats and so on. Anyway, I eventually managed to produce three TFs which matched their respective rakes and I now have three 2+7 HST rakes, which look more typical of the East Coast formations of the time. Here is one of the new TFs, showing off its new interior lights. I actually think it's better with the interior lights off during daytime running, as the lights are too bright otherwise. They come into their own during night running sessions though. I have also weathered a couple of Traffic Services Ltd polybulks. I was very pleased with the way these came out. Here are a few shots of them... Here are some other shots of some of the other wagons in my Speedlink rakes... First up is a suitably weathered Cavelex BBA. This is a lovely wagon which runs beautifully thanks to its weight. It would look even better with a nice steel load. Next is a humble and well-used OBA in Railfreight livery with a timber load... And another china clay bogie wagon, with extra weathering... As my rakes tend to run in fixed formations, I have also been fitting tail lights and end buffer detail to all my rakes, particularly the freight stock. Here is a shot of a china clay slurry wagon bringing up the rear of a Speedlink service... In other news, I have rearranged the use of one of the fiddle yards to maximise the length of my longer freight rakes, particularly the MGR rake and the bogie oil tanks. These are now able to run at their full length - 23 x HAAs and 10 x TEAs respectively, which makes for some nice-looking trains. If I eventually decide to replace the HAA rake with either Accurascale or Cavelex's versions, it's going to be expensive! I've put a lot of time and effort into weathering my HAA rake and making loads, so I'm going to take my time deciding what to do about that. Finally for now, a few random shots taken during a running session... An HST arrives from Aberdeen bound for KX... A rarity in Edinburgh, as 56013 does the honours on an MGR service to Cockenzie Power Station, routed via Waverley. Two shiny HAAs recently outshopped in the new Coal Sector livery lead the rake. 37418 trundles through the station with a Speedlink service... ...with the newly weathered polybulks in the formation... Another couple of projects I've been working are two Class 60s. These were bought in the liveries I wanted (Coal and Petroleum sectors), but Hornby has done such a botched job on them that in the end I decided a complete respray was necessary. These are now nearing completion. I find it very frustrating that, as an amateur, I can get the colours right, so why can't Hornby? Even the yellows that Hornby used for the ends of the two locos were completely different, so I even had to respray those. Anyway, rant over. I now have a couple of very smart looking 60s, Coal sector 60078 Stac Pollaidh (a favourite mountain of mine) and Petroleum sector 60065 Kinder Low. Here is 60078 on a proving run (after fitting with a Legobiffoman sound chip) before its recent light weathering and naming... Some minor layout maintenance has also been going on with a reversing module having to be replaced on one of the fiddle yards. I have also bought a booster module for my ECoS system, so that I can run two trains at once with the coach lights on. The ECoS system as bought only seems to be up to powering one lit train at a time. Well, I guess that's it for now. I hope it won't be another five months before my next update! Cheers for now, Dave

Stop it, guys, just stop it now. You're going to bankrupt me. I already have several Deltics on order, not to mention 4 x 37s, and I'm considering a rake of HAAs too.