Chris Chewter

I did a bit of tinkering of the close up shot of 3711 outside the goods shed. I think it looks good with a bit of grain and in black and white.

Shunting seems to have progressed, although there seems to be more chat than work going on in the yard.

3711 is back, and appears to be shunting the yard. Something on that 24t wagon must have caught the firemans eye.

5819 in the headshunt at Tetbury. That firemans still drinking tea!

A look down from the cottage hospital sees 5819 in charge of the branch today. Its seen here after the single coach train has been brought into the platform. Although an autocoach was used on the branch, the crews didn't have the clips for auto working, so always ran around the trains.

I've always been in two minds about this loco. It was designed for my previous Cornish layout that didn't happen. I made it because I was interested in the fact that someone near the end of steam took off the front number plate and reinstated the numerals on the buffer beam. When it was painted up, there was a blemish in the paintwork. No problems, 4549 was a filthy machine at the end of its life. https://www.rail-online.co.uk/p130586643/h303D8E62#h303d8e62 It was my first weathering attempt and I always felt it looked a bit ropey. However it doesn't look too bad here: I guess it can stay. I need to treat it to some Modelu lamps, but signs and gutters need to come next.

Looking down from the cottage hospital at Tetbury, it appears that 5819 was in charge of the train the other day. Looks like the fireman is in no hurry to change the points, he's still drinking his tea!

I saw one photo in Randolph where a number of horse boxes for polo ponies parked in the headshunt. I thought I'd try a similar photo for something different. With the cows previously purchased for the field behind the goods shed, they've found a temporary home in the cattle dock. The photos in Randolph always show the dock empty, but I think it gives this area a touch of life. However the open doors on the dock might need to be corrected at some point! I also took a photo of one of the recently weathered wagons next to a Bachmann factory weathered wagon. I think its passable and looks better than the tipped out of the box finish, although I think I could go a little heavier on the weathering to the frame and wheels. Not too sure why the Bachmann wagon is heading to Spalding!

3711 has brought in a single coach train from Kemble. And another view once the loco had run around its train

If you can look past the tension lock coupling, I simply love the shadows cast off those rivets!

A couple of studies of 5532 by the goods shed at Tetbury

A bit of a lazy weekend, so no progress on the layout. Modelu guttering has turned up so that I can sort out the guttering on the prefab. Its so tiny that I decided to shelve that for another evening. I've shelved the signs until some photo quality paper turns up, as I don't think plain A4 paper will be up to the job, so waiting for that to arrive. I did manage to find time to do a few focus stacks. This one is probably the best that came out from the weekend.

Following Checkrails suggestion, I've been trying to track down a suitable font for the signs. Firstly is the Transport fonts which can be downloaded from https://www.roads.org.uk/fonts which seem to be close but not 100% correct. However its free and hopefully the inconsistency on the capital G will not be obvious once its fitted below the station canopy where only the most adventurous of camera lenses will reach. The most accurate I've been able to find is Caslons Egyptian which can be downloaded at https://store.typenetwork.com/foundry/fontbureau/fonts/caslons-egyptian/regular. I'm not too sure I can justify $40 to create six signs, but if you are, you can be safe in the knowledge that your G will be correct! This is an example of the Transport font And the Timbertracks signs for comparison

I know. Such a mixed goods never reached Tetbury. Its just to demonstrate the six wagons that I've attacked with weathering powders in a single photograph. Wagons to Tetbury seemed to consist of a coal wagon or a van attached to the back of the lunchtime service train with a toad or brake van on the back. The exception seems to be when the railway was closed and a special train had to be commissioned to extract the wagons from the yard. As with the toad, they are subjected to a black wash, earth brown powder to the frames and smoke grey to the roofs. I don't think they are prize winners but have got to be better than their original pristine out of the box finish.

I would say a rough shunt, but it turned out that the DCC chip caused the body to hog upwards. Its now been corrected and sitting much better on the chassis.

Whilst setting up some photos, the cleanliness of some of the wagons is really starting to stick out. That toad looks far too clean! I shelved the signs and after an application of black wash plus some earth brown weathering powders around the frame, hopefully this looks a bit more realistic. I still need to find out whats wrong with 3711 as that bend in the footplate looks really strange!

Perhaps its a subliminal message to run a pannier special in BRM. How about an Autotank for variety?

This photo was heading for the recycle bin until I adjusted the brightness. 3711 shunting the goods yard at Tetbury:

I decided to do another job that I've been putting off, the station signs. Three signs hung from the platform canopy. The photos suggest that when the station was used as an unstaffed halt, these were painted out black before being removed. However as I want to model the last days of steam, the signs were still in use. Why have I been putting it off? Because I keep making a pigs ear of it! I've tried paint the sign black and dry brush the white. I've tried paint the sign white and overpaint in black before removing paint from the surfaces, which is the technique I've gone with. This is about as good as I've got it, however they still look a bit of a mess from this angle: Not so bad from this angle: Also, the "Gentlemen" sign that comes with the kit is probably twice the size it should be. I guess it all depends on what angle you view them really: But just about acceptable from others For some reason 3711 has a bent running plate since fitting a stay alive in the cab, which I need to look at. Perhaps I've over tightened something. Am I being over critical? I might give it another go in a few days time...

5532 has been put on duty at Tetbury after the usual 14xx failed. Its seen here shunting the yard after bringing the mixed goods train in at lunchtime.

You might have noticed from the video above that I have fitted the fire irons to the back of the 14xx locos over the weekend. I also found that I had commissioned Narrow Planet to make some etched nameplates for these locos to sit over the recessed fittings.

Not alot done to the layout over the weekend. I've spent most of the time enjoying running the layout. I did try to improve the chuff rate to 1474. At the moment this is the best I can do. I was also a bit frustrated that it was stopping a bit quick, but some adjustment to CV4 has helped that.

I thought people might like this focus stack. 1474 on shed.

Waiting for plates to renumber this one as 3647, which was photographed on the line. Until then, it'll have to remain as 3711

Tried to fit a stay alive to the Zimo decoder but without success. Disassembling the 14xx is so fiddly, sometimes you just have to admit defeat! Anyway, I’ve been trying to adjust the chuff rate in the other 14xx. This was the attempt at the weekend. Still not happy with it as it was stopping abruptly. Some more work to do here.