Jump to content
 

Ravenser

Moderated Status
 View Profile  See their activity

  • Posts

    3,562

  • Joined

  • Last visited

  • Days Won

    1

 Content Type 

Blog Entries posted by Ravenser

  1. Ravenser
    A large part of the problem with this unit is the underframe, and the black box masquerading as a large part of it . This was fouling a point motor casting on the layout [quite possibly the one I've now resited] so it needed to go if the unit was ever to run again, quite apart from the fact it looks unrealistic and unsightly.
     
    Fortunately I had two packs of MTK castings on hand . Not all of the castings are actually needed, since the engine blocks and a number of the boxes are already free-standing mouldings. And some of the castings are no use to man nor beast - especially the 4 cast whitemetal dartboards which are supplied in lieu of air tanks. The definitive proof that Dapol sent a development model to China for tooling which used a set of MTK castings is provided by the presence of these same curious dartboards on the RTR model.
     
    The black boxes simply unscrew and drop away, which is great. That on the power car contains a great shiny rough-cast block of a soft but very dense metal. It couldn't possibly be lead - the notoriously rigorous Chinese H&S regulations , tightly enforced by vigilant and incorruptible officials, would never permit that. But there's a lot of weight there and it needs replacing.
     
    I've araldited in place the replacement castings, built up the fuel tank to a box and stuffed in some more lead - fixed with more araldite. I've also removed the moulded underframe exhaust pipe and silencer and replaced them with the equivalent MTK: it looks slightly better and every bit of weight helps . I've left the Dapol/Hornby moulded exhausts on the end - although there is no fat cylindrical section (filter? silencer?) on these, there isn't on the MTK castings either so there's no point in changing them.
     
    The metal plate between the chassis and the seating moulding has been replaced with lead flashing to compensate for the considerable weight lost when removing the black box beneath. Electrical insulation tape has been wrapped round the edges to protect the wires from the trailing bogie which run alongside - I don't want any sharp edges cutting through wires from the pickups. One slight drawback to all of this is that the lead is not rigid and therefore the power car chassis is now a little flexible in a way that it wasn't, even when the seating unit is screwed back into place.
     
    Here's a view of the finished result:

     
    I've also filed down and refitted all the glazing along the sides to achieve a flush result. It was an awful lot of work, and I must admit that I'm now in two minds about the result, especially where the main side windows are concerned. It is not nearly as neat as I would wish, and it does rather shout "hand-made!" at you. It's more accurate, but I'm not confident it's a lot more convincing. I'm seriously thinking about leaving the main windows alone if I tackle my second, long-forgotten, 155 at some time in the future. The small windows in the doors would still need doing, but when surrounded by a very dark blue the main windows are much less obvious and the RTR finish is much neater than I can achieve. The Hornby Pacers, where the inset of the windows is much greater, and the number of windows involved much smaller , are another matter.
     
    Further upgrading work on the ends involved fitting etched gangway plates robbed from an A1 Models 156 upgrade kit (I have all the necessary bits for a 156 in the Hurst kit someone on here sold me), and adding Hurst cast brass snowploughs. The projecting lugs on the latter around which you pour superglue gel need filing down a little to get the chassis to seat neatly at the ends.
     
    One key upgrade, though a fairly simple one, addresses the problem that Dapol simply omitted the solebars and extended the bodyshell down to where the bottom of the solebars should be. The chassis clips inside as if this were an integral construction coach like a Mk2 - which it's not.
     
    The traditional fix for this is to paint on a fake solebar, which is what I've done, using Tamiya masking tape and brush painted Revell anthracite - a useful "off-black". I also added lifting points over the bogies with scraps of 40 thou plasticard filed to the body profile (These actually now help to get the body off)
     
    Roof aerial plates (A1 etch) have also been added. Snowploughs from Hurst Models brass castings (remember Hurst Models?) were deferred as I was hoping to get the unit ready for Blacklade's first show, so I could display multiple unit working with a 155 + 153 consisted.
     
    However the 155 had other ideas and fought back at the last moment, stopping dead......
  2. Ravenser

    Postcards from the Layouts

    By Ravenser,


    Operational
    As Blacklade is effectively completed, and so is the Boxfile there isn't too much to post in the way of layout construction these days. Lockdown efforts have mainly been focussed on sorting out the litter of unfinished stock projects - and if the truth be known, drifting into one or two more. And those things have gone onto my workbench blog..
     
    However just to prove that the silence is not that of the grave, here are a few snapshots from when each of them was last up - "Pictures from an Exhibition" as it were.
     
    Firstly , the last time Blacklade was up. As well as test running the NBL 21 and having a Blue Period operating session I got some of the post-privatisation stock out of its boxes to check it still ran and give it a touch of maintenance. For some reason - probably that the 1980s are of more interest to me, and I have a full suite of stock for 1985-90 whereas there are one or two things I need to sort out for post-privatisation - I've not run as 2000-7 for a long time.
     
    So the Type 5s got an outing each :

     
    57 011 has always been a pretty reliable performer, and as my most compact Type 5 , is designated for fuelling point diesel traffic and engineer's trains in the post-privatisation period. Here she is test running the two green Railtrack opens to check they are fine. (They were.) I really ought to apply a little mild weathering to this one. The loco-hauled substitute set can be seen in the background.
     
    (This loco was bought as a return off the Bachmann stand for about £40, over a decade ago in the days when Bachmann sold their repaired returns off the stand at Warley and Ally Pally. I think the Fox transfers and the plates to renumber her added 50% to the price... Someone else in the group already had 57 010)
     
    And here is the other green Type 5:
     

     
    This is more of a ghost from my involvement with an abortive club layout project some years ago.  66 532 isn't really that suitable for Blacklade being a good inch and a bit longer than the 57. The container train has nothing to do with Blacklade: I acquired two FEA twins , a Realtrack "ball-bearing" twin and a pocket wagon and built and painted some C-Rail containers. Several of these containers are work-related from the days when I used to work for a carrier. The Hapag 20'OT is a resin Mendip Models kit that hung around in the cupboard for years. This is as many of the wagons as I could get on the layout.: they hadn't been out of their boxes for about a decade.
     
    And now for the Boxfile:

     
     
    Construction of a Parkside OHV steel High and reconstruction of a Slater's rectangular tank from my youth were written up here . However handsome is as handsome does - they were built to replace one or two existing wagons of questionable reliability in the Boxfile's fleet. So they can't be deemed fully and finally "done" until they've run through an operating session and behaved themselves. Here we see the rectangular tank in action, and as a bonus I've finally fitted coupling bars for Sprat & Winkle couplings to the Hornby Ruston 48DS I bought at Warley last year. It runs nicely - so I also have an extra loco in traffic.
     
    And yes, both wagons are good 'uns. They slide in and out of the back siding very reliably.  Which is something of a relief. The Ruston 48DS also runs nicely, at a very satisfactory and controllable speed for the Boxfile. There is too little space for it to run with the supplied runner wagon for additional pickup so occasionally it hesitates at a frog, but that can't be helped, given the nature of the loco and the layout. All in all I'm pleased with my purchase, and the price at which Hornby pitched it was excellent.
     
    But... on checking the two boxfiles which hold the stock, I find I still have five wagons "carded".  One - the LNER unfitted van - is at least serviceable if run the right way round. More damaging is what is carded. Total stock currently stands at 13 vans (incl Conflats); 10 minerals (incl 1 tank) ;  6 opens. The correct ratio for the layout is supposed to be 4 vans, 1 open, and 2 minerals for an operating session. In other words I have 6x the opens, 5x the minerals  - and only just over 3x the vans. And what is carded is 1 van, 2 Conflats, a Bachmann 16T slopesided mineral, and a Dapol 13T LMS open. At the most optimistic view, I have 11 serviceable vans when I should have 18-20 vans. One of those 11 is questionable, another is slightly questionable, and a third is a rather rough Lima van with a new chassis
     
    And every single RTR chassis - a Conflat, a 16T mineral and a 13T open - falls off entering the back road. That's a very sobering situation.
     
    Surveying the stockboxes I find myself forming some further resolutions to address all this. An old Hornby refridgerated van is being reworked as an ex NER vehicle. It now has a scratchbuilt underframe so I gave it some test runs without couplings using the Ruston , and it seems to run very reliably. Lurking on my bookshelf is the long-unfinished DOGA etched van kit.  These two should at least address the fact that I'm light on LNER vehicles. The kitbuilt chassis on the  Conflat V is tight and rigid. Melting in a bearing with a soldering iron to create a little slop at on end might fix it. And ferreting in my modelling cupboard turned up a Parkside LNER Conflat S kit, and a packet of Bachmann small insulated containers. Since I can clearly build a kit chassis so that it stays on the Boxfile while RTR chassis fall off, this would be a possible nil-cost solution. With a bit of juggling I think I can just about get this into the stockboxes as an extra.
     
    I'm not sure what I do about the RTR wagons to make them run, so if  this ultimately replaces the Bachmann Conflat A a further slot opens up. I have two old Parkside BR van kits in the cupboard, one of which might fill the gap. That would get me up to 15 serviceable vans - a roughly  50% improvement on the current situation, at nil expenditure. 
     
     I ought to think about adding a figure or two to the Boxfile: nothing too much , but just a touch of life.
  3. Ravenser

    This Time I May Be Committed.....

    By Ravenser,


    Layout schemes
    I mentioned in a previous posting   Shifting Sands  that recent developments in RTR had tempted me to consider a possible 009 layout. Things have now moved on...
     
    In the end, the Bachmann Baldwins proved rather too tempting to resist. I think the tipping point was when a little internet research revealed that 2'6" gauge was a de facto British military standard up to WW1, accounting for the Admiralty operations at Chattenden and Devonport and the RNAD explosives factories and depots. 9mm gauge is of course just as "accurate" for 2'6" gauge as it is for 2' gauge. But lines like the Welshpool & Llanfair and the  Leek & Manifold were very much more "proper railways" in character compared to some of the 2' gauge quarry and industrial operations, or the traditional 009 "rabbit warren" layout - and as I noted in the earlier posting, I am after something a bit more substantial than the usual cute 0-4-0Ts and 0-6-0Ts. (The Festiniog was (and is) a substantial operation, but it's loading gauge is very tight - witness the saga of Russell's cab - and this makes its stock seem rather more modest.)  Now one Baldwin was re-gauged for the 2'4 1/2" Snailbeach, so re-gauging  to 2'6" ought to be possible... And if it was possible, why wouldn't a 2'6" gauge line operated by the British military have done exactly that? There must have been hundreds of Baldwins going spare....
     
    In short OOn3 representing 3' gauge would have been a significant hassle to do, but 009 representing 2'6" gauge is now dead easy, and would have some prototype justification. The Peco 009 "main line" track would be ideal for this look.
     
    So - the Dogger Light Railway it is to be. The back story is more or less as described in my original posting: the need to bring fuel, munitions and stores in by sea, and move them up from Doggerport to the RAF base provides a raison d'etre for the line, and a justification for running plenty of freight trains. The fact that the Great Dogger Mole is the only causeway linking the two islands will tend to force inter-island traffic onto the train, justifying some local goods (how else would you move livestock from one island to another?). In the inter-war period there would be hardly any private cars here - probably little more than motorcycles and bikes
     
    I can also justify running prototypical vehicles from other English narrow gauge lines. Some re-equipment would have been needed during re-armament in the late 1930s - the ex WD WW1 stock would have been nearing 20 years old by then. What would be more natural than that the Dogger Light would buy serviceable rolling stock from lines that were closing down, like the Leek & Manifold (1934 - and the same gauge) or the Lynton & Barnstaple (1935) and the Welsh Highland (1936)? In Ireland the West Clare - as the last 3' line to close - ended up with a motley collection of survivors from other 3' systems operated by CIE. A quarter of a century earlier the Dogger Light might have done something similar - after all the Longmoor Military Railway collected quite a few cast-offs from BR as well as its own ex WW2 WD-ordered equipment
     
    I have been quietly buying a modest amount of 009 RTR. I am now the proud owner of two Bachmann Baldwins. A decision has been taken to standardise on Bachmann WD opens , and Parkside kits for ex WD vans - not least because getting lead weight into vans is easy , and the Bachmann open wagons have the merit of weight. (This was after I bought 1 Parkside open wagon kit).  I bought an L&B open in plain grey, and an L&B composite in plain Indian Red. The latter was something of a mistake. I meant to buy the brake composite to give an instant passenger train. And these are really rather big vehicles - a slight embarrassment on tight curves. 
     
    An error when clicking to add to basket resulted in my buying two of the Golden Arrow Models whitemetal kits for the Southwold's 0-6-2T "Wenhaston" when I only meant to get one. Still they are entirely credible as locos ordered as part of the Royal Navy's pre-WW1 buildup. I assume that the railway's earlier locos - or most of them - were worn out by intensive use during WW1and the Baldwins represent replacements in 1918 or so, using what was then readily available. A scout round Newark show at the weekend produced a Minitrix 2-6-2T off a second-hand stall for a bargain price of £30 - it runs very nicely, though I'm a little daunted by the need to cut down the chassis block. Provisional names for these will be "Dogger" and "Fisher" ("German Bight" was vetoed as too long for the side tanks and conceding rather too much to the opposition... )
     
    I also acquired a Dundas 4-wheel passenger guards van at Newark - the composite needs a brake, the goods trains also need a brake and this option was cheaper than buying a Peco Glyn Valley brake and repainting into Indian Red - as well as an Irish 4 wheel open to go with it. This latter is no doubt a relic of the pre WW1 railway... I have a resin kit for a Southwold van tucked away somewhere, and I bought a pair of Peco flat wagons recently because you get two wagons for £17.25... Two whitemetal kits for IoMR bogie coaches (brake and full) from NNK  are tucked away as well. These are more modestly proportioned than the Peco L&B stock.
     
    Liveries of Bauxite/Indian Red for coaching stock and grey for wagons have been adopted.
     
    The concept for the layout is shown here - unusually for a concept sketch this one was drawn to scale.
     
    Dogger Light.pdf
     
    I have my eyes on the Airfix RAF Bomber Re-Supply set: a fuel tanker and trailer is needed to move aviation fuel from the railhead to the RAF station, bombs can be wagon loads, and many of the other items can find a use on the layout. Motor transport on the island is likely to be military. Having bought a boxed set of four Airfix 1/72 aircraft kits cheap a few years , I'm very tempted to have a Mk1 Hurricane coming into land dangling from a little fishing line. They became operational with the RAF in 1938, so that sets the date for the layout - military activity is presumably being prompted by the Munich crisis. Clive Mortimore suggested at Newark that a Bofors gun would be appropriate as both anti-aircraft and anti-shipping defences - Airfix do one of those, too.
     
    I haven't tried any Airfix military kits since I was a young lad - this gives me a chance to dabble in another branch of modelling
     
    I have also acquired two semi-circles of Peco 009 Setrack curves. So I now have a basic circle on which trains can run round on the dining table . Table-top railways indeed!
     

     
    Fortunately the IoMR coaches are at least a centimetre shorter than this one...
  4. Ravenser
    One of the "benefits" of a blog is that it records just how long certain projects have actually been stalled.
     
    This is a case in point - behold I bring you the world's slowest quickie loco kit!
    http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/blog/296/entry-14093-baby-deltic-1/
     
    The Silver Fox Baby Deltic has been stalled and lying in the paint-drying box for a horrifying 4 and a bit years....
     
    I am at least now making some progress
     
    One issue was highlighted here http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/137857-traction-tyres-repair-or-replace/
     
    I now have a traction tyre from Kernow - their last of that type apparently. On comparison with the wheel it looks a little small - but there are no other more suitable traction tyres available. (I also have a kind offer of large section heatshrink)
     
    For the moment I'm going to gamble and hope the superglue bodge actually holds in traffic. Tyre replacement , and heatshrink are fallback plans 1 and 2
     
    In the meantime matters have advanced this far:
     

     

     
    The bodyshell has been weathered, and given a coat of matt varnish to seal. The glazing has been fitted.
     
    The stretched cl29 underframe, which had been floppy to the point of breaking has now been heavily reinforced and is solid. I'm not convinced it's actually 100% straight, but I hope any error (of the order of 0.5mm-1.0mm over its length) will be taken out by natural flex as it is fitted into the body
     
    The etches for the fuel tanks etc have been formed and superglued in place. I've added plasticard between them to make the whole thing look vaguely solid rather than simply two facades. One of these has acquired a hand-carved shallow curve after I spotted that the thing projected rather lower than the bogie frames and panicked. The resin generator/alternator/whatever has been cleaned up (outside - resin scares me) and glued in place
     
    The motor bogie, which has been cleaned and oiled now needs a test run with clips before fitting into the bogie frame. Then it only remains to wire up, add a decoder (a TCS MC2 is in stock) and test run on the layout. A good run in on the rolling road can follow.
     
    Oh, and add another cost of glass varnish to the headcode boxes and side windows
  5. Ravenser

    Payment on Account

    By Ravenser,

    I haven't updated the blog for rather a long time. The truth is that I've been rather quiet on the modelling front - but a bit less quiet than it appears.
     
    Now the prospective exhibition booking has slipped into next year, I'm suddenly feeling a bit disinhibited. All the things I couldn't really work on because they weren't relevant to a BR Blue period I can now work on again. So.…
     
    Some progress has been made on the wretched Coopercraft Tourist Brake Third this year. Unfortunately it is never going to be my best coach - there's been a further minor issue with the glazing - but it does now possess a roof, and that roof is now weathered and ready to stick down . Detailed post will no doubt appear at some point
     
    I've bitten the bullet and acquired two of the new Bachmann OO9 Baldwins . So the possible OO9 layout sketched here http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/blog/343/entry-20376-shifting-sands/ is now a project not a pipe dream. The second Baldwin came as a bargain from Rails so I also acquired two Bachmann WD opens - on the premise that vans are more expensive and can be built from Dundas kits, with weight inside. Both locos have been run in on the DCC Concepts rollers I bought last year at Warley. I also now own a Peco brake coach in nondescript Indian red (shades of the NSWGR..)
     
    I have made further progress with the Airfix Trevithick loco. Unfortunately one shaft bearing gummed up and the motion sheared off the flywheel. I need to sort out reattaching it , somehow - having come this far , I'm not giving up on working motion. Another detailed post to follow....
     
    And I dug the part-finished Baby Deltic out of a box. That looked like a quick result might be possible , until I found this: http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/137857-traction-tyres-repair-or-replace/
     
    And I haven't got hold of Kernow during the week, so the project is still stalled, although I have at least given the body a weathering wash this afternoon - the roof was already done. The motor bogie has at least been dusted off and oiled, and can be tested. Once this issue is resolved , it should be fairly quick to finish the loco
     
    And a strictly off topic distraction... During my holiday , the local WH Smiths had the first issue of a Games Workshop partwork . I thought £1.99 for 3 pots of Games Workshop paint and a brush seemed a bargain , so I got one - the "magazine" and figures effectively coming free. For the hell of it I read the painting instructions and painted the figures, in pursuit of developing figure painting skills . Something was learnt , though more colours are plainly needed to do the job properly. I was even tempted to pay another fiver for the next issue with three more figures, another pot of paint, and the basic items for games play - but as WHS didn't seem to stock it I didn't. Still, a good deal more than £1.99's worth of value has been obtained
  6. Ravenser

    Troublesome Trucks

    By Ravenser,


    Operational
    When I built the tea-tray in which to mount the Boxfile, I had the naïve idea that replacing the damaged track and sorting out the track joints between the two files would solve all the 'file's running problems.
     
    Unfortunately what it actually revealed was that there were problems with the stock. A replacement Tenshodo rejuvenated the Y3, a little running in helped the Knightwing shunter - and then it became painfully obvious that all was not well with the wagon fleet.
     
    An extensive programme of testing , recorded in a spreadsheet , resulted and it seemed that Romford wheels and lightweight vehicles were the obvious issues. So I set to, and started tackling them.
     
    It's been very much a snakes-and-ladders experience and my last comment was, once again, over optimistic
     
    Things that were supposed to work - turn out not to. I took the boxfile along to a recent DOGA area group meeting, and a fresh clutch of gremlins crawled out to gloat at me. (What is the correct collective noun for gremlins? A breakers' yard?)
     
    The LNER unfitted van -compensated -that ran with rock-solid reliability before I fitted the couplings now falls off with absolute predictability. The GE open jumped the rails unless taken very gingerly. That one at least is explicable - at just 32g I was pleasantly surprised it ran in the first place. And several locos found a tight spot at the file joint on the coal siding and fell off.(The wagons didn't seem to mind it),
     
    The latter problem was duly sorted out with a couple of panel pins inserted to force the track back to gauge and a careful trimming-back of one of the plasticard gap-inserts , which was not quite flush - and now all locos run down the siding very happily.
     
    But the wagons are proving more difficult. I've just tackled another 4 of them with mixed results. An ex Airfix LMS van has received Hornby wheels and more weight, and lo and behold it now runs reliably. However at some point it's lost its vac pipes, so I need to reinstate those
     
    And while I was about it I managed to get a little more weight into the GE open , which is now about 45g and much more reliable
     

     
    (However the Cowham & Shearer PO seen next to it is still a bit marginal at only 32g and with nowhere else really to add weight)
     
    A little testing and tweaking of couplings meant that a Bachmann Conflat lost its red-card and was declared fit for traffic. But despite adding still more lead under the load and pushing its weight up to 50g a Bachmann 16T slope-side mineral still falls off, every time a coconut, when running one way round.
     
    What's disturbing about this is that these two wagons have ready-to-run chassis, and Bachmann wheels. Both weigh 48-50g. You'd expect these to be absolutely and unquestionably reliable - instead I've been struggling with them.
     
    Even more disquieting - when I started tweaking the height of the wire on the S+W couplings to stop the Conflat uncoupling at the file joint it promptly started to derail on entering the siding - every time
     
    I really don't understand why adjusting the couplings should result in a wagon derailing. The only thing I can come up with is the brass paddle touching the axle and somehow causing a derailment. Anyway I now have a Conflat that doesn't derail, but uncouples every time it's pulled across a particular joint. And if I adjust the wire I get a Conflat A that stays coupled - but derails every time it's pushed across the joint. Not a happy set of alternatives
     
    But this throws a worrying light on two of my other failures - the LNER unfitted van and the 16T slope-sided mineral . Is it the couplings that are somehow causing derailment? These two chassis really ought to be completely reliable. I have an awkward feeling the van may have couplings salvaged off the Blue Spot Fish - which also derailed
     
    I don't understand what is going on here, or what should be adjusted , and I have a regular problem with wagons becoming uncoupled at a particular joint. I can no longer simply put this down to a really ropey track joint because that has been patched.
     
    Some pictures to lighten the mood. Here's two I made earlier
     


     
    These two now have Sprat & Winkle couplings and seem to run reliably - touch wood.
     
    I'm now down to 5 "hard cases". The LNER van and the Chas Roberts slope-sided 16T have been mentioned already.
     
    There's the Conflat V I built with a Red Panda chassis under a spare Parkside floor and homemade bits along the edges (I don't think you can say a Conflat has sides) with a Bachmann container on top. It weighs 48g, the sheet says Romfords though they might just be Hornby under the paint, and it falls off with great reliability. My spreadsheet notes that the chassis is tight
     
    There's the Parkside BR van I built at a wagon-building class. It's always given trouble because the chassis was completely rigid and somehow twisted during drying. I ended up melting in a bearing to create a little slop - but it doesn't like the back siding. My spreadsheet says Hornby wheels and 48g. There is framing on the underside which rules out compensation. I really don't know where I go with this one.
     
    And finally the steel High - an old Dublo open body on Parkside chassis. 35g, Hornby wheels, and no room underneath to stuff more lead. Hmmm.
     
    Perhaps I ought to finish this off as another LNER van...
     

     
    It's been gathering dust on the bookshelf for a frighteningly long time - I think I started it even before the boxfile...
  7. Ravenser

    Served Up On A Tray - Dessert

    By Ravenser,


    Boxfile
    We left the Boxfile last time safely installed on its new tea-tray, but with the track joints still to patch, and scenery to touch up.
     
    The track joints were not at all good - they never have been. In the worst place I think there was a horrifying 4mm long gap in the railhead.
     
    The solution was a bodge I've used in one or two places on Blacklade, though not on quite such a scale. This is to cut a sliver of 40
    thou plasticard and superglue it in place in the gap. Once the cyano has thoroughly set - i.e. after an hour or two - trim it down to rail level with a sharp craft knife, and the gap is patched. The plasticard "railhead" will inevitably show white, but the patches are normally very short, and the wheel ought to be fully supported across what was once a void - with all the benefits that implies in running
     
    This is fine if you have a fishplate underneath. You then have a firm base on which your scrap of plasticard can rest , and to which it can also be glued.
     
    However thanks to my losing battle with the fishplates, in several places I didn't have that luxury. At least on the middle road (cue a photo so you can see what we're talking about) there were plastic insulated fishplates underneath, even if they didn't actually connect with one side.

     
    I managed to get scraps of plasticard in place and solidly set with superglue . I trimmed them down - the rail is now more or less continuous - but unfortunately this revealed that the track is not quite flat across this joint, and small 4 wheel shunters may stall at this point and need a touch of the finger. Admittedly it's a lot better than watching the Y3 claw itself out of a pit, like a WW1 tank crossing a trench.
     
    The final joint was rather more trouble, and desperate expedients were tried. I superglued a scrap in microstrip in the rail web across the gap, I packed the Gaping Void with scraps of balsa and bits of Exactoscale support foam , and once the Void was no longer bottomless I managed to superglue another scrap of 40 thou in place in the gap. I left it a couple of hours to set completely , and trimmed down the plasticard - fixed.
     
    The Exactoscale foam proved an excellent colour match for the ash ballast, and I packed the gaps . Then I managed to find the original black flock to sprinkle over it - and found that the original black flock was not a colour match with the rest of the "ash ballast". I had to resort to off-black paint let down with grey - and it still isn't a perfect match , though you won't notice this in the photo.
     
    The next job was trying to restore the rubbed areas of the Metcalfe cobbling . I tried a grey watercolour wash, in the hope this would penetrate the card, so that the colour would persist. Colour-matching again proved a little tricky - and how far it will resist continued cleaning we will see. But for the moment at least the damage has been patched up.
     
    Then I test ran a few locos - and was sharply reminded of the running problems with the Boxfile. Further action required...
     
    As Warley was only a few days away, I headed for the West Midlands with resolution, my debit card and a list. On the Saturday evening I returned with a DCC Concepts rolling road, and a new Tenshodo for the Y3 - the existing one being a hopeless case. Branchlines sold me a 26mm wheelbase unit, which they tell me is what it should take. This replaces a 28.7mm unit, which is what
    was recommended when I built it.
     
    The Knightwing shunter was given a good long run on the rolling road and is greatly improved . The Boxfile's worst two locos are now as good as the best..
     
    Then I started testing the wagons in a fit of enthusiasm - and it rapidly became clear that all was not well. To cut a long story short, I ended up testing all the wagons , and even resorted to generating a spreadsheet...
     
    The problems largely involve wagons derailing when entering the back road which serves the cold store and wagon hoist. Clearly this is not an issue caused by a dodgy joint between boxfiles. In principle it's a track issue, but it's exposing marginal problems with the wagons. And since "the rules of the game" require all wagons to go under the hoist first, the problems need to be sorted out.
     
    The spreadsheet logs wagon description, weight, wheel type, company, work needed, whether compensation units could be fitted, and performance - Go (meaning it runs consistently reliably in both directions through both roads, either way round), Go? (a slight query over reliable running), Marginal (it derails intermittently) and No Go (consistently derails in one or more of the permutations)
     
    When wagons stopped because of broken or missing couplings were added to the equation I had a wretched 14 wagons serviceable out of 32...
     
    Of 11 vehicles marked No Go or Marginal , 7 have Romford wheels. 8 of them weigh 35g or less - none weigh the full 50g, though several were only a little short
     
    A GE open weighing only 30g on Hornby wheels is Go. So is a compensated single bolster weighing 35g
     
    Action was taken. Three wagons have had broken couplings fixed and are back in traffic. Two more have been fitted with Sprat and Winkles and released to traffic. The Blue Spot fish , which looked a bit too big anyway , has been repainted rail blue and consigned to Blacklade; I've pushed on with the MICA which is to replace it , and which only needs varnish and couplings. A fish van has received Hornby wheels and been pushed up to 50g - it's now fine
     
    I aim to finish off a couple more wagons this weekend, but I now have 22 serviceable wagons (plus 3 more which are unsuitable for the Boxfile anyway)
     
    And so the current state of play....
     

     
    The LNER van has acquired its couplings, the PO coke has had a coupling mended, and the MICA awaits a varnish coat and couplings
  8. Ravenser

    Served Up On A Tray - Main Course

    By Ravenser,


    Boxfile
    The deed is done - or at least most of it. On Saturday I duly trotted off to the local DIY sheds. Unfortunately Wickes and B&Q locally do not cut timber , and Buildbase - who might - were closed. But a sheet of 5mm ply in B&Q was only £5.47, so I bought it anyway.
     
    Having got it home and marked out the cutting plan I discovered that if you heavily score the desired cutting line on both sides with a Stanley knife you can snap 5mm ply along the line much as you would do 40 thou plasticard. This is a great deal quicker, easier and more importantly neater and more accurate, than cutting it with a tenon saw.
     
    I rapidly had a base plate , two sides 2" deep, and a back 1 3/4" deep (the lesser depth being in order to clear some of the switches and sockets at the back )- the components are visible here
     

     
    I then marked out where holes needed to be drilled for the two switches and one socket that fouled the back and drilled accordingly - the DIN socket required a 20mm wood drill and some hacking with the Stanley knife. A check fit revealed that the holes needed bevelling with a knife to allow the switches free play - this was done before I started assembly, with one side and the back glued to the base with PVA. This was left to dry hard overnight
     
     
     
     
     
    The next day - being Sunday - I set about trying to sort out the damaged track, removing about 2 inches of damaged Streamline from the fiddle yard area. I have to say that getting fishplates to slide on to anything was a terrible struggle - I managed to write off the first bit of replacement code 75 in the process, and the second had its integrity maintained by soldering in two sleepers improvised out of PCB sleeper strip. In the heat of the struggle, I ended up with the two rails about 2mm out of alignment lengthwise, which created further problems - ie gaps at the rail joints.
     
    Possibly I might have done better by trying to insert a couple of PCB sleepers into the original damaged track to restore it. However as one rail had ripped out of the moulded clips over at least an inch and a half , that too might have turned out to be a struggle
     
    And in the process of checking alignment with the other boxfile , I found that one rail of the point had also come loose, and had previously been kept in position by the fishplate. As I could no longer get a fishplate on the relevant rail, I had to resort to inserting a half-sleeper of PCB strip and soldering the errant rail back into place, assuring the correct track gauge by use of a roller gauge
     
    You will gather that having separable boxfiles leaving the track ends exposed at the joint is not a great idea if you want long term reliability
     

    I managed to get the two files together (I got fishplates to join 3 of out the 6 rails!), and stuck them down in place on the plywood tray and stuck the remaining side in place. We then reached this stage:
     

     
    At this point I retired hurt to bed.
     
    Having applied a second coat of laquer black, on the Monday night I was ready to attempt a little test running. The results were mixed.
     
    Yes, everything was now quick to set up. A little paring of one hole, and all the switches worked without obstruction. The points all threw reliably and emphatically.
     
    And locos ran. They ran across the joints between the files as well as they had ever done - which is to say not especially well. Because the gaps on the rails were in places pretty horrible. As the photo below shows....
     
    Next step - patch up the joints with plasticard, and touch up any damage to the scenic - notably where the Metcalf cobbles had been worn by track rubbers

  9. Ravenser

    Served Up On A Tray

    By Ravenser,


    Boxfile
    This is by way of a short "statement of concept" note.
     
    The Boxfile (formally Whitefriargate Goods) has been out of commission for a couple of years, after the end of the fiddle yard track became damaged. At one level this simply means a basic and fairly straightforward repair. But it has thrown into sharper relief the main problem with this layout.
     

     
    That's the board joint. The two files are currently held together - when assembled - by fishplates connecting the tracks. This arrangement has proved vulnerable to damage of the exposed track ends, and it's a bit of a pig trying to slide everything together, as some of the track doesn't cross the joint at 90 degrees. It's very fiddly, and there's a risk of damaging the track.
     
    As a result of this setting up the 'file has taken 10-15 minutes of fiddling about, which is a serious disincentive to using the layout
     
    And when you've got it all together - the track joints across the gap are pretty rough, which has affected running
     
    When I was toying with the idea of building a tramway micro as a boxed diorama, using IKEA storage boxes (see http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/blog/343/entry-18982-im-not-committed-to-building-this-you-understand-mark-2/) I noticed that there was a version of the product that was effectively a tray, and I had the idea of buying one and fitting the Boxfile inside it, permanently assembled
     
    This idea faded away when I discovered that IKEA weren't actually selling the storage item in question http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/119680-snack-boxes-are-back-at-ikea/ but has now resurfaced.
     
    I thought the stumbling block would be storage. At present the Boxfile lives in a storage drawer under the bed, along with two boxfiles containing all the stock, a small stash of modern N gauge which I ended up acquiring, the controller, light and some empty boxes. I had thought that if I mounted the complete layout on a tray it would no longer fit in the drawer.
     
    And the flat is very full, and there is nowhere else obvious to keep it.
     
    However some actual checks last night revealed that if mounted in a tray it should still fit.....
     

    (This picture may be some help to those folk who believe they "don't have room for a model railway")
     
    So it's game on.
     
    The intention is to use 4mm ply to construct an open-fronted tray to act as a frame around the assembled layout. This means in practice a flat piece of ply (tee-hee - the ply will have to come from Wickes or B&Q as the local timber merchant has gone) with strips of ply along the sides and back. The files can then be glued down inside, with the track properly joined , and the damaged piece replaced and relaid across the interfile joint
     
    I don't think the bottom of the files are entirely rigid anyway, so the whole thing may actually end up flatter. Sides will be 1 3/4" deep , as this should avoid some of the switches and DIN sockets . Holes will have to be drilled for the rest , and I might consider removing one or two of the entirely pointless section switches I originally installed
     
    The fronts and lids of the files would still fold up to provide a sealed and protected unit, but the layout would effectively be a single unit 29.5" long, meaning I could simply put it on a table, plug in the connectors, set up the light, add the stock and away we go.
    Some of the reliability problems at the joints would also vanish. No longer would trains auto-uncouple entering the fiddle track, or jolt across a chasm.
     
    The ply tray will probably be painted black - I have a tin in the airing cupboard, so long as it hasn't gone off
     
    And if the layout can be set up quickly and runs more reliably it should be used more. I can invest time in finishing off a few wagons, and maybe building up a Judith Edge Sentinel or two from the cupboard. A Peckett or a Barclay could be contemplated.....
     
    The DIY sheds beckon tomorrow
  10. Ravenser

    Set 5 - Quick and Slow: Part 1 Quick (I hope)

    By Ravenser,


    Constructional
    After a long while contemplating the idea, I finally bought one of the Dapol LMS coaches in CKD form . I prefer CKD form as it's a little cheaper, and as I'm going to work on the thing I am saved the trouble of finding out how to dismantle it. The intended victim is a CK in BR Blood and Custard
     
    The CK seems to be the pick of Dapol's ex Mainline Stanier coaches - Coachmann's expert assessment is here
    http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/67996-making-use-of-Dapol-lms-coach-kits/?p=958249
     
    And it's also - perhaps not by coincidence - a notable omission from the high-spec range of Stanier coaches that Hornby produced a few years ago.
     
    Having decided to build the Mailcoach LNER Tourist Brake 3rd as a partner for my Hachette BR Mk1 SK (forming Set 4) , in part because their gangways match , I was left with an LMS Porthole Brake 3rd kit.The obvious question was what could it be paired with - and a Dapol CK seemed the cheapest and fastest answer. That would also provide some First class accommodation - something which will be conspicuously lacking from Set 4. Also conspicuously lacking from the steam stock is anything in Blood and Custard - because I don't feel up to doing two tone liveries myself . Getting a factory applied finish is therefore a big bonus.
     
    What needs to be done to these CKD coaches? The 60' underframe on the CK is basically correct - unlike the 57' coaches, which incorrectly have the non-corridor underframe . Detailing work is shown in the photo:
     

     
    The new whitemetal buffers aren't terribly clear, but they are there . I bought an LMS underframe pack and set of etched crossmembers from Comet at Stevenage , at the same time as buying the coach. The spare battery box casting will be donated to the MTK Porthole brake as an upgrade
     
    So to the body
     

     
    The first job - and the biggest "win" is flushglazing. I used SE Finecast vacuum formed glazing because Shawplan have not done this vehicle in their Lazerglase range - a surprising omission given that this is a decent model; and the only RTR option for a key type of vehicle. I also touched in the window edges in black to reduce the slab-sided effect - since my hand wasn't absolutely steady and the black line isn't absolutely perfect this is a double edged benefit, but it doesn't detract overall.
     
    The roof vents are a story of blunders . I "upgraded" with a packet of whitemetal torpedo vents. But... LMS official photos in Historic Carriage Drawings show shell vents on LMS Period 3 stock. Pothole stock - which was built under BR - clearly had torpedo vents , and so did the push-pull conversions of Stanier stock . LMS Period 3 vehicles in preservation often - but not always - have torpedo vents. I eventually found a photo of a coach on the ex GW Birkenhead route that seemed to have a mix of shell and torpedo vents - then I found a comment suggesting these were a special type of vents made at Wolverton.
     
    It looks as if some LMS Period 3 vehicles received torpedo vents at a later date , but how many, and whether it was while they were blood and custard, or only after preservation I don't know. By the time I realised there was an issue the vents were irretrievably stuck with cyano and the roof was painted a suitable muddy brown-grey, so I've left it. It may be right, after all.
     
    The interior was painted and a small number of figures added, though you hardly notice there are passengers in there.
     
    The plastic wheels were replaced by metal Hornby ones. I retained the Dapol gangway on one end, and used a Roxey pack to sort out the other . I say "used" advisedly , as most of it wasn't. To be honest the project stalled for a couple of months because I was scared of assembling the Roxey gangways , and in the end I looked at the etch, looked at the drawing and instructions, should my head in several places and only used the etched back of the gangway. The paper looked impossibly flimsy, and I used black card, but 5 folds proved too much and cased problems (read "derailments") on sharp curves , so I cut one fold away with scissors and reapplied the end plate. This was black painted plasticard - I used the Roxey etch as a gangway cover on the fixed end
     
    All it now needs is a weathering wash on the underframe
  11. Ravenser

    Work in Progress

    By Ravenser,

    I didn't get round to my annual New Year's Resolutions posting this year - a bad sign. Thanks to a new job and various domestic renewals not a lot of modelling was done in the couple of months before New Year, and even less posting on here took place.
     
    Nevertheless rather more modelling took place in 2016 than was written up in this blog. The trouble is, it left rather a lot of unfinished business. For the last few years I've been stating with depressing regularity that I'm not going to take on any more projects - it's time to catch up with my backlog. And somehow it never happens.
     
    Four years ago I decided that it would be a great idea to get various unbuilt kits and unused kettles out of the cupboard and field them as a scratch team to work a (not terribly authentic) steam period , c1958. Four years on, and my best estimate is that the number of outstanding coach kits and upgrade project has reduced by - a big fat zero, thanks to further additions. Mind you , four years ago my coaching stock comprised a few RTR items plus various kinds of material for projects - and only about 2 vans ever turned a wheel on the layout. Since then 10 items of coaching stock have gone into regular service, one more awaits a partner to do so, and 3 more are nearly there. Yes, I keep picking up bargain projects but the total spend including bits has been under £200.
     
    And I now have 6 kettles and LMS 10001 up and running and earning a crust. There are still a couple more that need sorting out, but we're getting there.
     
    So what is currently lingering on the bookcase?
     
    Various items to comprise Sets 4 and 5 of the steam stock are in various states of completeness. This saga started with a BSL Gresley steel CK , which was going to be paired with an LMS non-corridor brake 3rd - until I realised the BSL kit was actually gangwayed. So I bought a Coopercraft /Mailcoach Tourist Brake Third Open, back in the days when Coopercraft still had a few coach kits actually available.
     
    I've heard unfavourable comments about this kit from far better modellers than I , and I now understand why. I started it in the middle of last year, thinking a plastic kit would be a pretty manageable task, and it's proving a pig. It will be paired with the Hachette Mk1 which I upgraded last year having succumbed to the lure of an astonishing bargain - that one did get written up ,http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/blog/296/entry-17819-set-4-modernity-on-the-cheap-part-2-sidetracked/ though the wretched Tourist Brake Third hasn't been . All the Hachette Mk1 needs is a replacement set of Kadees, as the NEM pockets are at the wrong height.
     
    At Ally Pally last year I bought what I thought was an astonishing bargain - a metal coach kit with punched aluminium bodyshell for an LMS Porthole Brake 3rd "almost complete" for a fiver. Unfortunately it turned out to be MTK , not BSL.... I am told it is one of their best items and perfectly buildable. "Almost complete" turned out to mean "missing one guard's ducket" - replacements were sourced - and it was while I was turning over all the bits to assess what needed to be done that I drifted into starting the Tourist Brake, on the theory it would be an easier job than a metal MTK coach. I'm starting to think that judgement was seriously misguided.
     
    But this has spawned a further project. The LMS used "British Standard" gangways which are not a particularly good match for the Pullman gangways used by the LNER and BR. Dapol produce an old model of a 60' Stanier Corridor Composite, and Coachmann seemed to rate it http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/67996-making-use-of-Dapol-lms-coach-kits/ So at Stevenage a couple of weeks ago I took the plunge and spent £13.50 on a CKD one , plus another £8 on underframe castings and etched frames - some of which will go to other projects. This is in carmine and cream - in 1958 there ought to be at least one vehicle in the fleet still in blood and custard, and I'm scared to attempt it myself. Getting a discount in order to be spared the trouble of dismantling a built coach is a bonus , and work has begun, after an order went into SE Finecast for flushglaze . (This included flushglaze for an old Lima Mk1 SK from my teenage layout which may finally get a heavy upgrade and re-enter service. I sourced three more of the Phoenix Precision Mk1 underframe trusses last autumn , and I've got some Comet BR underframe castings in stock. Maybe a TSO interior can be substituted)
     
    Beyond that the vista opens up of combining Sets 4 and 5 to produce a mainline train, which would look the part behind 10001 if I ever have access to a larger layout. Buried deep in the cupboard is the second hand Triang-Hornby RMB I bought as a teenager and repainted into blue/grey with a basic brushpaint job. Stripped back, repainted back into maroon with a replacement underframe truss and Comet underframe castings , and other detailing , something adequate to sit between the two 2-car sets could result. That's a 5 coach corridor set. Add, in the fullness of time, the BSL Gresley composite...
     
    I digress - which is the problem. I have an exhibition booking for the layout in 2 month's time (bit less actually) . I should be focussing on BR Blue stock for that.
     
    Top of the pile is the 128 Parcels unit, which is most of the way there, and would let me get the NRX and GUV into service - both are too long for Platform 2 in a loco-hauled parcels.
     
    Next priority is the Lima 37 which runs , has a decoder and Kadees, and is part detailed. This needs to be finished as a spare loco in case one of the 31s has a problem at the show
     
    The gangways on the 155 need finally to be sorted out. They still won't take a crossover. This will be attempt 3
     
    And once we are clear of the show I can turn to the Provincial Pacer. I played about with this a little, for the first time in some years , a couple of months ago - though all that was done was a little interior painting . If I can finally get to grips with this unit, which will be a pretty heavy DMU upgrade project, I will have a lot more options for joining and splitting DMUs using consisting
     
    I also really ought to finish off the Baby Deltic. It's not a priority, because it's not suitable for the show, but it's another stalled project that really doesn't need too much to finish...
     
    Something is stirring on the N5 front. I may be going to extend my skill set and we might get another kettle into traffic later in the Spring
     
    As for things like the WD brake and the Toad E, the GBL Jinty, and what have you, they are a long way down the list. Not to mention a few smaller jobs, like lights and weathering on the W Yorks 158, maybe working gangways on the 150, and even weathering the 108. I really ought to install the detailing bits on 20 052 - and it's high time I did something about the failed decoder in 20 063.
     
    There's the maroon ex LMS 42' GUV I bought for a fiver at a show in October (Comet bogies needed?), and the Mainline Mk1 bought at Showcase for a few quid for a possible bullion van conversion (I've since realised why it was so cheap - the windows are wrong. However with this conversion only one compartment window per side will be retained and as it would run in parcels trains I might get away with it)
     
    But if I can finish off most of the projects that have been started, that should go a long way to clearing the decks
  12. Ravenser
    [What with a new job and sundry other distractions I've been pretty quiet on here for a while, though a certain amount of modelling has taken place. This entry has been sitting unfinished in draft status for some months - rather than delete the thing I've finally tidied it up and released it into the world out of its time slip....]
     
    I had the layout up and the result was a bout of decoder fitting and test running. And I'm beginning to see why some folk view DCC as black magic.
     
    Four locos or units were involved, plus that long-term problem child the West Yorkshire 155.
     
    First up, the little Hornby J50 which I bought at Ally Pally because I thought the bank might pull the plug on Hornby in the near future so this might be the only batch of the models we ever see. I managed to get a late crest loco for a decent price off Hereford Model Centre - this is a J50/4 and a little online checking reveals that 68982 was at Immingham, Colwick, and Frodingham , probably the only J50/4 with a long term E. Midlands career, most being London engines. Possibly I should have got an early crest J50/3 instead, but the deed is done, and at some point I shall renumber - I just hope that the transfers I have match Hornby's printing and I only need to change the last digit
     
    I had a TCS UK direct plug decoder in stock, so that went in, there was no need to remove any weight,and it runs very nicely.
     
    I have previously toyed with the possibility of using a station pilot when Blacklade runs steam - I have a GBL Jinty and Hornby chassis in stock and wondered about giving them something to do. Once all the decoder fitting was completed I had a kettle operating session and I found that having a shunter as pilot substantially improves operation. It gives you an alternative way of releasing locos when you're boxed in, it's excellent for rearranging parcels vans and a very useful and interesting addition to operating . So I definitely don't regret spending the money: the J50 will see a lot more use than expected.
     
    Here it is in the fuelling point having taken out the LNW set to release a kettle:
     

     
    I was also very pleased with the sudden improvement in reliability when running the kettles. The L1 ran an entire session without falling off, despite it's still unmodified pony truck, the LNW set ran without problems now a bearing has been eased, the MR set behaved itself perfectly and so did the parcels. I found the newly operational electromagnets under platforms 1 and 2 useful to uncouple locos , and generally it was a confidence-building session. The BR Blue period has worked pretty smoothly for a while - now the kettles are getting there, too
     
    I'm even toying with the idea of resurrecting the elderly Bachmann 03 diesel which has been lurking in a drawer since Ravenser Mk1 was dismantled. It will mean hardwiring a decoder and fitting Kadees, but it's very small and I should be able to find somewhere for it to lurk amongst the Blue period stock. There's a Bachmann 08 hiding away in that drawer as well - from the first issue, so there's no socket and hardwiring will again be necessary.
     
    Second up for a decoder was the Replica MLV chassis for the 128. This took a large Gaugemaster decoder, tucked in with double-sided sticky tape, and duly programmed. I found it a distinctly slow-running mechanism until I started doing some tweaks to the motor control on other locos and suddenly discovered that I had input max volts to CV5 as 128 when in fact the values go up to 255. In short I'd halved the maximum voltage... It's been corrected.
     
    Third up for a decoder was the Fowler 2-6-4T which I bought second-hand at Ally Pally a couple of years ago. I took the body off to see what would be involved in hard-wiring the thing - and found that there was a decoder socket in the thing. If I'd known that I'd have had it up and running ages ago....
    A Gaugemaster Opti Small went in this - and the thing barely ran. As it had run pretty happily when I got it (I took the precaution of testing it on the DOGA test track ) I applied a bit of lateral thinking and carefully oiled the valve gear and motion, and anything else that the service sheet said you should oil, using some .033" handrail wire to apply the oil. After two rounds of application, the Fowler tank ran pretty well, though it's not quite as smooth as the L1. I suspect that sustained use will help this over time, since friction in stiff motion is evidently the problem .
     
    The Fowler tank has since received Kadees - another job which I'd been dreading, but which proved surprisingly easy in practice - and is in traffic, replacing the O4 which found the undergauged spot in Platform 3
     
    The fourth loco to get a decoder was a Lima 37, picked up for a song at DEMU Showcase a couple of years ago because it was in two tone Sector grey and carried the number of the intended target loco. That - as far as I can now recall - got one of my last TCS MC2s, since it is a (straightforward) hardwired installation. As this is a vintage Lima ringfield mechanism - albeit a sweet-running one -the speed curve had to be tweaked to hold down the volts at the midpoint : this means that the loco is much more controllable in much finer gradations at lower speeds. In fact you have to get past speed step 90 before you are going to see any surge in speed. On an 8'6" long layout nothing ever gets turned up that far. Whatever may have been the case for Spinal Tap my PowerCab doesn't go to 11....
     
    One problem did emerge during test running - a tendency for the unpowered bogie to derail in platform 3 (yes that bit of track again) . This was tackled by adding the weight taken out of the 155 when I rebuilt the underframe. Unfortunately this proved a bit too much for the motor to handle with comfort, and I resorted to cutting down the weight to about 2/3rd size with a hacksaw. Although a silver metal on the outside , inside it was a soft dark grey metal. It couldn't be lead, of course. After all no Chinese factory would dream of breaking health and safety regs by electroplating a lead weight to disguise what it was....
     
    And so to the 155 , which simply refused to move when taken to the club test tracks a few months before. I put it on the tracks . I checked the programming . It ran fine . I checked if DC was enabled . It was. I have no idea why it refused to run on DC previously.....
     
    (But the wretched thing still derails on a 3' radius crossover, so it needs a third attempt at inter-unit Kadees. I do have some Parkside mounting blocks to take NEM swallow tail sockets, and I hope that will solve the problem
  13. Ravenser
    The Hachette Mark 1 has now been finished, with interior painted
     
     
     
     
     
    And here's the results. There is a problem , but it isn't obvious:
     

     

     
    When I was weathering the underframe somehow a touch of weathering wash got onto the sides. I cleaned it off with white spirit but the panel was still discoloured. I cleaned the whole panel back to plastic and revarnished - still a marked grey discolouration. I cleaned back and rubbed down with ultrafine gritpaper and revarnished - still clearly discoloured.
     
    I then found that Railmatch BR maroon is noticeably darker , and rather more purple. I brightened it up with some Railmatch Royal Mail red, mixed to a good match by eye, and repainted the panel.
     
    It's not an absolute match. In most lights you can't see a difference , and you can't see it on the photos. (It's the long panel under the 4 large windows on the left, by the way). But stick the coach under a fluorescent daylight lamp at a range of 6" and the side is pinkish and the patch is redder. And in some lights you can see a slight difference of colour between the door and adjacent panel.
     
    If anyone had patch-repainted a panel on the real thing after it had spent a while in traffic I reckon this is exactly the effect you'd get. But I can find no photographic evidence of such local emergency patching on coaching stock - and if it had gone near a main works they'd have done a full repaint. In the 1960s there were no graffiti or "tags" - that didn't start till the early 80s.
     
    So after feeling very pleased with how this had scrubbed up, I now feel considerably deflated with a bodged model. But I'm going to leave it "as is" for the moment because you can only see it if you know exactly what you are looking for and where to look. If I notice something when I bring it out again in a few months time having forgotten the incident - there's an issue. If I don't spot it and simply don't notice the issue when I'm not consciously looking for it - then it'll pass.
     
    While all this was going on, I got rather alarmed about the darkness and seeming purpleness of Railmatch BR Maroon. Especially as I'd just bought a spray can of the stuff for the Porthole Brake Third. So I dug the Coopercraft Gresley Tourist Brake Third out of the cupboard, gave the back of the sides a coat of Faded Rail Red - a nice pink shade, to boost opacity and act as an undercoat to relieve an over dark maroon - then one, two coats of BR Maroon on the front, carefully touching round the windows with a small brush - and yes it does need at least 3 brush coats for opacity, like Tony Wright said...
     
    By which time I'd concluded I was probably committed to building the thing. I know I can do a plastic coach kit...
     
    So far I've carefully built a set of Gresley bogies, and added a Comet whitemetal ducket, because I had to buy a packet of 10 for the Porthole Brake, which only needs 2
     
    Speaking of which, as promised here is the MTK Porthole brake kit as unpacked....
     

  14. Ravenser

    Bits and Pieces

    By Ravenser,

    I've had the layout up for a few days, and as well as a couple of operating sessions, I've taken the opportunity to sort out various jobs , as someone is slated to come and see it...
     
    The big one is that at long last the station building has been finished off, with an end, back wall and door, and the "bomb damage" is no more. Quite deliberately the effect is that a section has been taken through the building - rather than paint the back wall black , I used some Superquick red brickpaper - this marks the fact that this isn't really a wall of the actual building, but goes with the brown of the fascia, and gives a more muted effect. The overall result adds a seemingly substantial building as an end view block and adds surprising "weight" to the station. It does now look like a significant terminus in a substantial town.
     
    In a similar vein, the buffer stops that I started about 2 months ago are now done and in place. These are balsa buffer planks , painted red with some spare buffers fitted - a packet of old brass buffers which the header card described as GWR but which must have dated from Sir Daniel Gooch's reign , as they seemed to be Victorian solid buffers, plus two spare Mk1 coach buffers - the latter for the centre platform which is supposed to have been added by the LMR in the late 1950s when they were planning to divert trains from the Chesterfield Central line into Artamon Square ahead of the GC closures.
     
    Half a packet of Bachmann TMD figures have been installed - we now have a shunter on Platform 3, to avoid any awkward questions about how the driver of a departing loco-hauled substitute service can see the aspect of the starter when the cab of his 31 is past the signal
     
    While I was about it I had a rummage through my compartment box of small scenic details for any other figures. I came up with some rather useful BR figures and others which now turn out to be these http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/69215-1980s-model-people-in-00/
     
    A driver plodding down the platform with his bag, a member of platform staff , a woman in a leather jacket and a standing male passenger have been installed. I don't want a crowded platform - just a handful of people dotted around a half deserted station. After a hasty field survey of prototype examples locally I've come to the conclusion blonde is extremely difficult to paint effectively because it's generally a variable overlay over a darker colour . (I hasten to say I'm not married.... "Oi , what are you doing?" "Researching model figure painting , officer") Basildon station platform at 8am would be a figure painter's nightmare assignment .
     
    Otherwise a second Kadee uncoupler magnet has gone into the fiddle yard , for the release of kettles of the 2-6-4T and 0-6-0 varieties (it should also handle a 20 or 23) . The first one , on the long road, has proved effective in uncoupling the 31 on an incoming loco-hauled : meaning less physical handling of stock/fiddling with poles , which is useful when access to the fiddle yard is restricted and getting things on the rails properly distinctly awkward.
     
    Running with the BR Blue stock is now pretty rocksolid reliable, and certainly better than the steam stock - I have a feeling I'm going to have to do something about the pony truck on that L1 and the bearings on three axles of the LNW TK have been eased with an Antex so it runs reasonably freely
     
    The next job is sorting out the wiring on Tramlink so I have a proper DC test track.....
  15. Ravenser
    I've been pretty busy on the hobby front in the last few weeks. The trouble is that it hasn't involved making any models....
     
    A few weeks back I was helping with the DOGA stand at a show in the Midlands, which meant a couple of days away. Very nice and hopefully productive, some nice layouts , and I was a good boy on the spending front.
     
    Then the following day someone from one of the magazines came over to photograph the layout for an article, which will (I hope) appear in the next few months. This meant that the week before my show trip was spent frantically tidying up the flat cleaning the layout and the stock, and sorting out one or two minor issues - a dummy point motor reseated so that it doesn't foul the underframe boxes on the coaches (which it was doing in one direction) , and one of the accessory decoders remounted - I'd initially fitted it with double-sided tape, which NCE and Tortoise assure us is adequate for mounting purposes, but it must have shaken loose on the way back from the show. It's now held on with two screws as well.
     
    I've written the article, and gone through it three or four times to ensure it reads as easily as possible, unnecessary words are taken out and as much as possible covered within the word limit (I could have probably filled another 500 words, to be honest). Copies of the photos came by post - I've done the captions and the whole lot has gone off to the magazine
     
    After that came the club show and two days of stewarding and help breaking down.
     
    I'm afraid the cheque book suffered this time - when working with the etches for the 128 I was reminded yet again that a bending tool for etches would be very useful. So I treated myself to the smallest size of Hold And Fold - I'm not intending to build any 7mm etched brass Pacifics, so that should be adequate for my needs
     
    And given the shakiness of Hornby I decided I would definitely buy a J50, as there's a risk this might be the only chance I ever get. It's not a loco I definitely "need" but I've occasionally toyed with the idea of a cheap Lima body detailed on some chassis, so - I grabbed an early crest J50/4 off a boxshifter at a good price. A bit of renumbering will be required but 68982 seems to have been allocated to Colwick, Immingham and Frodingham at various times. That will do - I just hope Modelmaster numbers are the same size as Hornby's tampo printing, otherwise I'll have to replace the whole number
     
    Then there's my embarrassing little purchase. Someone had a couple of second hand coach kits for LMS Portholes - punched aluminium bodyshell affairs that I thought were BSL, and a fiver for a Brake Third seemed a great bargain
     
    Unfortunately it's actually MTK . Next time, read the label
     
    Blacklade runs very smoothly with DMUs. We're more or less there with the 31s and loco-hauled trains, though the Airfix 31 is a little sticky - no doubt attributable to its mechanism (I am starting to wonder if a drop of oil may be needed again), and I have had very occasional thoughts that a 25 might be an idea
     
    But the steam stock still has some bugs to be shaken out of it. The L1's pony truck is a particular offender, though it seems this is a well-known issue with various fixes being tried.
     
    http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/51794-Hornby-l1-front-bogie-derailing/
     
    http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/87326-Hornby-l1/
     
    (This is by way of a note to myself, so I can find the threads again) .
     
    I was somewhat less than chuffed to discover that Hornby's Fowler 2-6-4T has the same arrangement: that's supposed to be near the front of the queue for a decoder in order to improve the motive power situation
     
    And I'm even more convinced that the MERG accessory decoder must come out - rebooting the layout after a short is getting very tedious
  16. Ravenser
    Well, I've actually made a start on something . When Heljan announced their 128, Charlie Petty announced an offer on his 128 kit, pairing it with the then new Replica MLV chassis to give an easy build unit. So I bought one. And it's been sitting in its box, next cab but two off the rank, ever since.
     
    As it's now very close to the top of the to do list http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/blog/296/entry-17246-new-years-resolutions-version-81/ I' ve got out the box and made a start. It seemed a lot more promising than another bout with the 155
     
    And I'm starting to wonder why I've put it off for so long, because this isn't a hugely complex kit. I don't have to worry about getting it to run - the MLV chassis should take care of that , and its DCC ready as a bonus. There are NEM pockets. The basic bodyshell is 6 bits plus a roof. The livery will be plain blue. This is all eminently do-able.
     
    Needless to say I've created a few complications for myself
     
    Prototype inspiration is here , taken at Manchester Piccadilly on 10/4/85 according to the back of the photo. I'm reasonably certain this is 55994
     

     
    Now as you can see this is one of the 5 gangwayed cars ordered for the WR, with the gangway removed and plated over. All of the ex LMR cars built without gangways and with full cabs had gone by this point: the WR still had two of its batch, which retained their gangways, and the LMR had three, which had lost them
     
    Since Blacklade is somewhere in the Midlands I needed an LMR allocated unit , with plated ends
     
    Charlie sold me a kit with LMR ends on the basis that this would be easier to convert to the plated ends than the fully gangwayed WR ends. But 55994 retained her headcode boxes till the end - and scratchbuilding these onto the moulded ends would be a very awkward job to get right. However photographs show 55993 lost the boxes and had simple marker lights and 55995 seems to have been the same.
     
    Unfortunately I had removed the marker lights on one end preparatory to attempting split headcode boxes before I spotted these other photos. There were two packets of class 50 marker light castings in the box that I had sourced at some stage and these have been superglued in place as replacements on both ends. I'm not sure they're quite right, but they are the best fix I can now attempt. The centre of each cab has been plated over with 10 thou plasticard - I have virtually none left now , and it doesn't seem to be commonly on sale
     
    Here are the bits and the modified cab ends:
     

    Having now checked through what I have I notice that there are no engine castings and no bogie sideframes. Since Charlie Petty has all his kit material packed away in storage there's no hope of sourcing replacement bits from DC Kits, so it's a question of improvisation.
     
    I have an unbuilt Kitmaster kit for a Mk1 SK in my cupboard. I was always intending to replace the bogies with MJT Commonwealths , and I now have - somewhere - some development etched H-frame bogies with which to do the job.
    This means I can use the Kitmaster sideframes for the 128.
     
    Goulding's drawings are a bit basic around the bogies but the wheelbase and general style are the same. Some modification will be needed to cut away the tie bars and the representation of brake shoes , and I need to round the axleboxes and maybe add a couple of vertical strips to the frame. It won't be spot on - the bolster is different - but it should provide an approximation. I don't think there's any other source of suitable sideframes
     
    What I do about the engine is a good question . I suspect it will involve Milliput and probably plasticard, but we'll cross that bridge when we come to it.
     
    There's going to be a certain amount of approximation on this model. If I were working in P4 , no doubt I would be Damaging The Hobby and I might even have Blood On My Hands - especially if I slip with the scalpel while bodging the bogies.
     
    But I'm in OO, and I'm hoping for something that very much looks the part
  17. Ravenser
    It's that time of the year again when I contemplate the modelling cupboard, and mortality and start muttering bits of Marvell's "To His Coy Mistress".
     
    Virtually nothing has been done on the modelling front since I got back from Gaydon on 11th October. Post-show exhaustion, helping on the DOGA stand at two large shows , the DOGA half-yearly, a busy time at work, minor controversies , other interests, the run up to Christmas and being away with family during it have seen to that.
     
    The only jobs that have been done are to remount the Kadees on the Airfix 31 so it couples to the stock reliably, and to lower one of the Knightwing point motor castings so stock doesn't clip it. The Digitrax DS64 accessory decoder is still in its packet on top of the cupboard
     
    However I should have a lot more time to do some modelling in the coming months, so it's sensible to take stock and sort out a task list.
     
    Actually I already have two - the original pre-show list and the fault list from the show . So perhaps I should make a start.....
     
    The main task list ended up with three blocks, depending on how critical they were to the show and whether they looked like quick wins. Inevitably things from the first block got left and things from the second got done...
     
    Still outstanding from the Basic List then:
     
    - is the W Yorkshire 155. I'm at least 2 substantial postings behind in terms of writing up progress to date, but the current state of play is that I have an almost complete unit on which the connecting plugs for the Express Models lighting kit are fouling the gangways and causing derailment on any curve. And the motor bogie, which stopped dead before the show, and was diagnosed and fixed at the show with the Chairman's assistance, is now dead as a doornail again. I took it up to the Half-Yearly at Keen House to give it a run round the test tracks and get to grips with the problem of the lighting cable - and it sat there and refused to budge.
     
    Possibly the DC running function has been disabled on the decoder, possibly the thing has seized again, and possibly the problem is beyond the wit of man to solve. At which point I may find myself fitting a replacement Black Beatle and contemplating full-scale reconstruction of the bogies and more internal seating
     
    - A clutch of items are interlinked - and as they weren't relevant to the show they were left. The second board of Tramlink needs rewiring and while I'm about it a point motor installing .
     
    That will then give me a meaningful DC test track back, all of 6' long . At which point I can proceed with DCC installations on the Lima 37 and the Fowler 2-6-4T . From there is becomes possible to run them on Blacklade and start to think about Kadee couplings and upgrading the 37
     
    The rest of the Basic List is done, so we can move on to consider the Second Tranche:
     
    - The Baby Deltic really needs finishing off - it was dropped from the Basic List because it wasn't directly relevant to the show. But it might be useful to have a DC test track while doing so
     
    - And I need to build the DC Kits 128 I've had in stock for several years, and which has always been "next but one cab off the rank". Now I have a completed NRX van I need this to work it, and it would give me some more convenient options for consisting with my Modernisation Plan units: 128+101 or 108 is more convenient than 2 x 2 car units
     
    - Express Models lights fitted to the W Yorkshire 158 are another fairly small job with operational benefits - though in view of the problems with the 155 I will need to make sure that the inter-vehicle connection does not foul the ends of the vehicles on curves. (This unit has been closed up as far as I can with Kadees). I've decided there's no point fitting Kadees on the outer ends as the mechanism in the 158 is completely incompatible with the 153s, and 2 x 2 car units won't fit on the layout when the vehicles are 23m long. (It's not really a proper fit even with 57' vehicles).
     
    - The 150 can't be closed up because of the electric coupling bar. However I do have some A1 Models gangways in stock which can be fitted to sort out the gap. Not perfect but an improvement.
     
    As far as the layout fault list is concerned
     
    - The DS64 accessory decoder needs to go in. Some slight adjustments to the Knightwing point motor castings have been made but more may be called for.
     
    - The couplings on the olive Shark keep parting. I've made one attempt to fix this but will have to try again (the issue seems to be that the plough is deflecting the tail of the Kadee on the other vehicle)
     
    - The existing DS64 was held in place with double-sided sticky tape and this has failed
     
    - The Airfix 31 has caught on the platform edge at the entrance to Platform 3
     
    That then brings us to the Third Tranche - the stuff that last autumn seemed to be over the hills and far away.
     
    - I need to finish the rebuild of the Provincial Pacer with a new Branchlines chassis that was started ages ago
     
    - Weather the 108, paint the interior and add passengers
     
    - The fiddle yard track on the boxfile is damaged and needs replacing. Flexible track for this is already in stock
     
    - Now I have a Hurst Models upgrade kit, I can sort out the 156. This will be a fairly major project
     
    - Finish the WD road van. This took a tumble off the bookshelf and some repairs are needed as well. One for warmer days, given the danger of working resin indoors
     
    - Assuming I can't tweak the current stock, I will need to replace the point into the cripple siding on Tramlink with something gentler and relay the siding itself. I have a point in stock - Streamline small radius live frog - which would be a significant easement , but involves chipping out old track. All a bit messy - which is why I've fought shy of tackling this for a long time. I did think of using Peco's recent code 75 concrete sleeper track , but ripping up all the track and completely relaying and re-ballasting is more than I have a heart for (I'm not Coachmann)
     
    - Insert a Hornby 0-6-0 chassis into the Great British Locos Jinty, and perhaps even getting a DCC decoder into it.
     
    This highlights one issue - I'm getting a bit stale. Blacklade has been my main modelling project , and indeed for much of the time my only one, for about 7 or 8 years. It might be nice to strike out with a fresh challenge. But with such a backlog , and so much other stuff in the cupboard a completely new direction seems a bad idea.
     
    Trying to finish off Tramlink, and knock the bugs out of it would give me a project that's quite different, but which is 60% done already - and it wouldn't add to the oppressive burden of unfinished projects . I haven't built a building in ages......
  18. Ravenser

    First Night Nerves

    By Ravenser,


    Reflections
    The layout has been to its first show. We survived. (Actually it went quite well.)
     
    Some years ago I was involved with a rather unhappy club project. That layout's career culminated in a disastrous trip to a show as a part built item. Some of us in the group had hoped that this would mark a turning point in the project and that we could put on a good show for the public to re-establish some credibility. Unfortunately that was not to be, as someone who technically was not part of the group unilaterally decided to rewire one end of the fiddle yard and replace the control panel software during set-up. Neither worked, and having left the clubroom on the Thursday with a working layout I walked into the hall on the Saturday morning to be greeted with "We've just run our first test train: there are only 3 roads working in the fiddle yard, and you can only use them from that end."
     
    There were other problems, and in retrospect that awful weekend was the beginning of the end for both the group and the project. At a personal level I spent three-quarters of an hour pacing up and down my room that Saturday night vowing that when I finally extricated myself from the project I was never, ever, going to be involved in any way ever again with any kind of layout group or group layout..
     
    So it's fair to say that I have a lot of what Aussie cricketers call "mental scarring" where exhibiting, exhibition layouts, and operational reliability are concerned, and my attitude in recent years to the whole business of exhibiting has been rather ambivalent
     
    Yes, Blacklade can actually be fitted into the back of my car. Yes, in principle the layout could be exhibited. Yes, it has in fact been taken to a couple of small informal closed events on a "show and tell and run some trains" basis. But - I've not actually done anything to get it invited to any shows, or even tidied up a few loose ends that were left outstanding. If the idea of exhibiting ever crossed my mind I was inclined simply to lie down in a darkened room until it went away......
     
    That was until the chairman of a group I belong to volunteered me for the high-jump.
     
    The society was going to mount a presence at a largish show. The stand would be there, and so would be a couple of layouts owned by members. There was even to be a small dedicated room. Excellent news , and a venture emphatically to be supported.
     
    Then it appeared there was a small glitch. It seemed that there was some kind of small gap.
     
    At which point I get an email from the chairman: "How long's your layout?".
     
    To which I made the mistake of replying - "8'6" " .
     
    "Right , you're going to Middlemarch".
     
    After which there was a reassuring silence for about 6 weeks. Then an email from the organisers arrived. Details and photos were sent back to them, with which they seemed happy , and I received a formal invitation. The first symptoms of panic appeared.
     
    The first task was to tidy up some minor electrical work - detailed here: http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/blog/343/entry-16577-electrifying/
     
    Then there was the question of drapes - which was ably dealt with by my operator and his wife.
     
    That sort of cleared the decks on the layout front.
     
    There were various administrative matters to attend to, but basically my attention could be focussed on stock. How productively is another matter.
     
    The big effort was a desperate attempt to push the 155 on to completion, since that would give me a spare unit to play with. More precisely - the layout was to be shown as BR Blue modern image layout, c1985-90, since that's the suite of stock that's more or less complete. For that period the red and silver wave West Yorkshire PTE livery on the 158 is strictly incorrect (although it doesn't jar); however the 155 is in the earlier red with white stripe and would be spot on. Having it in service would also allow me to consist, with 155+153; and that formation fits neatly in Platform 3 and in one road of the fiddle yard. Even better, if I could build my DC Kits 128 I could run 3 car Modernisation Plan formations by consisting it with my 2 car units.
     
    Sadly it was not to be. I'm at least 2 blog postings behind on the 155, but suffice it to say that by the weekend before the show I had pushed it to the point where I had started test-running the chassis - at which point it suddenly died and refused to report CVs. A desperate rushed installation of the new decoder (which I had hoped to avoid till after the show) ended with a dead chassis and the decoder refusing to report CVs. Frantic testing with a multimeter could reveal no shorts and no missing connections. Having apparently blown two decoders in quick succession, I could go no further.
     
    Meanwhile unexpected pressure of work meant that the 128 had dropped off the to-do list entirely.
     
    Back to layout administration. I had knocked up a layout description and emailed it to the organisers for the programme (though they lopped off my opening flourish "Welcome to BR's "crumbling edge of quality" - wholly appropriate I think as description of what I'm trying to portray")
     
    With a new operator, and first time out on the circuit, it seemed prudent to arrange some operator training.
     
    So my main operator came over one Saturday when he was en route to an evening engagement nearby, and we spent a couple of hours running the layout and going through the various party-piece moves and recovery measures. One further issue showed its face - he had only just bought a PowerCab and this was the first time he had tried using one in anger. As we had 2 PowerCabs available, I tried operating with his PowerCab as a "slave" handset. This works , but there is quite a crippling lag in response with the "slave" handset. Another consideration was that all the route macros are on my PowerCab . We agreed he would bring his Powercab to the show as a backup, but mine would be used for operation unless it failed.
     
    The layout behaved absolutely faultlessly throughout the afternoon- much to my surprise and relief. My decorative spirit thermometer was reading about 24 degrees - I suspect that the points may actually be heat-sensitive, since when I was struggling with point throw during the summer the ambient temperature was commonly 25-28 degrees
     
    One absolute essential for a DCC layout, at least in my book, is a sheet for the operators listing every single item of traction, with number and DCC address. Otherwise nobody knows what they're doing. I drew one up in Word as a table, and emailed it to a fellow exhibitor for plastic lamination. The address sheet shows the TOPS number, class, TOC/Livery and address, with a column showing whether the item does or doesn't have lights, and another one showing the consisting code . (see here) http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/blog/343/entry-16399-multiple-as-in-diesel-multiple-unit/
     
    Since I envisage the sheets being used at future shows I added several other items likely to be finished in the near future (e.g. the 128) with a warning mark
     
    The exhibitor's paperwork arrived about a week beforehand. Wheels were cleaned during the week before, and I assembled an emergency toolkit - strictly out of duplicate tools in case I somehow lost the lot
     
    And so to the event itself.
     
    I loaded everything into the car on Thursday evening, and drove into work the next morning: since I have to park in the street on an industrial estate I draped a blanket over the boards and took the holdall with the stock into the office. I left work a little after 1pm , and was soon onto the motorway. An hour into the drive I stopped at a leafy service station for water and a sandwich , then pressed on as the gantry signs were warning of delays ahead - that proved to be a false alarm, and I was checking into the accommodation, a Holiday Inn in a nearby spa town, by 4 o'clock.
     
    I then got a phone-call from my main operator to say he was already at the venue, which was open for setting up, so I drove out with everything to get Blacklade set up.
     
    The venue, a modern museum in open country,, is one of the glitziest places I've seen used for an exhibition; but its one big drawback is that it is cut up into various relatively small rooms - in that respect it was more like the typical school venue. We were in a dedicated room at one end of the venue, with three other society layouts and the stand. For exhibition purposes Blacklade sits on tables (the legs are a bit embarrassing) and two tables (phew) had been provided. Blocking out had not yet been done and proved a little fluid, but to cut a long story I pushed the tables against the wall, set up the layout along the front edge - remember Blacklade is a maximum of 1' wide, narrowing to 5" at the central board joint - and got all the electrical equipment plugged in.
     
    Here we are - I was tense, nervous and uncertain, and not really up for recording every moment for posterity in case I fell flat on my face, so this is the only photo.

     
    I had brought two clip-on lights, but to be honest the lighting in the room was so good that we decided they actually detracted from the overall effect and they went back in the bag. Stock went on the layout, the track was cleaned (do it the other way round) and I did a little test running. Coupled with operator training in recovery measures and stock recognition (Do not assume that a steam-age modeller knows what a 101 is)
     
    We managed to get a short on the station board. That knocked out the MERG decoder , all points on that board dead - unplug PowerCab and 16V auxiliary supply, plug back in, reboot. . Test decoder's back in business- try Point 3.
     
    Point 3 doesn't move. Try point 3 the other way.
     
    Point 3 doesn't respond. Sits there silent and still. Points 1 and 2 throw. Try again in rising panic. A 2 day show with one point on the station board dead and my longest platform locked out of use....
     
    Desperate measures taken. Clear the stock, tip up the layout. I had an earlier problem with intermittent failure of one output to respond . I solved it by moving the point concerned - this point - to the spare output. I'll have to put it back on the old output and hope to limp through the show with all the route macros out of sync.
     
    I had actually removed the first wire when the penny dropped. The point concerned was now on output 4 . Point 3 didn't throw - because output 3 isn't connected to anything. It's now point 4. But as I only ever use the route macros, I hadn't remembered that. Point 4 - throws.
     
    Panic over - stock back on the layout , and we head out of the venue, back to the hotel, and to a local waterside pub with decent food.
     
    The next morning, after an excellent breakfast with operators and adjacent layouts (including the striking sight of Simon Kohler sharing a table with his successor) we headed off to the venue and were in place for 9:30
     
    The first hour, when I was operating, was not good. The Airfix 31 would not stay coupled to the loco-hauled set, due to misalignment of the Kadees. It wouldn't stay coupled to the engineers' train either , thanks to the plough interfering with Kadee tails. (I thought I had sorted that). The parcels derailed. We had several renditions of the Hokey Cokey with the power supplies to the PowerCab and 16V auxiliary bus in order to reset the MERG decoder. A matter of 15 seconds each time, but I was getting tense and edgy given the need to deliver reliability in front of the public, and that tends to result in operator error.
     
    After an hour I handed over to another operator, and took the wretched 155 with me in quest of Digitrains. The venue was by this time packed tight with people, and traders were busy, but I left the unhappy thing with them to test the decoder, having bought a Gaugemaster budget decoder to supply a harness with which to test the TCS MC2.
     
    I also bought a little plasticard with a view to inserting it into the offending Kadee on the 31 to pack it up. That didn't work, so loco-hauleds were canned for the day and we dropped back to a plain vanilla DMU operation. From then on, Blacklade ran more or less without any problems until the end of the day - the only remaining issues being caused by an operator forgetting to set the route or moving the wrong unit. When I returned to Digitrains late on the day, the crush had eased and they confirmed that the decoder was not merely alive but running very happily on their test rig.
     
    We shut down for the day ,and went up to the exhibitors reception. This I think would have been improved by providing something a little more substantive to eat - certainly despite it being billed as a 2 hour affair I think pretty well everyone had gone after an hour. We were with the operators from the other layouts in our room, but somehow folk didn't seem to mingle, and I didn't meet anyone from other layouts. After this we headed back to the hotel and off to the pub for our evening meal. On the way I spotted one of those punning names that you only find on layouts - a local solicitor named Wright Hassell (Just say it... ) Someone is clearly modelling in 305mm to the foot scale.
     
    Sunday began with a determined effort to get the 155 into traffic. A seized armature was diagnosed, oil applied and the whole thing run for 5 minutes to loosen it up. This seemed very promising : unfortunately the plug of the Express Models lighting kit was catching across the gangway and derailing the unit, so that was that, and it went back in the box. On the plus side I remembered that I'd packed a 20 as spare loco, and while it wasn't suitable for passenger trains the oil tank and a limited parcels service could be reinstated. Watching it drift slowly down from the fuelling point into Platform 1 was very satisfying.
     
    Sunday was busy but not quite such a crush and we ran through the day pretty comfortably, with operators changing hourly. This meant we all got a reasonable chance to see the show and the standard was high . It isn't possible to mention all the excellent layouts present - a number of them have operators who are members of this forum - but one layout quite new to me which caught my eye was Sydney Gardens - a finely modelled diorama of an elegant part of Bath which happens to have the GW main line running through it. Cavalcade layouts normally leave me cold, but here the outstanding setting was modelled so well that it was an admirable foil to the trains (I have seen it suggested that Brunel deliberately designed this section as a showcase for the GWR, displaying his railway to the gentry taking the waters)
     
    There were - as it happens - no layouts in non-commercial gauges other than one 3mm layout. I only realised that after the show - which demonstrates just how high a standard of railway modelling is attainable in OO. The absence of P4 and EM simply didn't register - the show was full of top-quality modelling
     
    And by the afternoon I'd had enough of rebooting the MERG decoder and bought a Digitrax DS64 (like wot we have on the other board) to replace it.
     
    After the show closed at 4pm , we packed up the stock , dismantled the layout and took it out to the car. I realised that as Blacklade is my home portable layout I am actually pretty adept at breaking down; and the fact that the boards are light enough to carry in one hand through the venue helps no end.
     
    It's a curious fact that we ran through a 2 day show without cleaning either wheels or track after set up. I had too many other things on my mind to remember - and the stock never reminded us by stalling. This is quite a tribute to the mechanical merits of modern RTR
     
    With good access for vehicles outside the whole thing was quickly loaded, and my wheels were turning at 4:57pm
     
    The journey home was hindered by the major road works on the A45 on the south side of Coventry and at the junction of the M6 and A14, both of which cost at least 20 minutes, and by a stop at a Little Chef for a bite to eat.
     
    The following morning it was back to work.
     
    The show netted no additional invitations to exhibit , which is not surprising since there were quite a few big high-profile layouts at the show, and exhibition managers would naturally have been drawn to them instead. I have no illusions that I was other than last and least in the layout list - but we were to a perfectly respectable standard, and I don't think Blacklade looked visibly out of place in such distinguished company. I was extremely relieved and heartened by operational performance through nearly all of Saturday, and the Sunday. Despite minor problems the layout was running smoothly and reliably - there is a short list of matters to be fixed, but nothing that makes me doubt the fundamental soundness of the layout.
     
    Would I do it again? Certainly
  19. Ravenser

    Electrifying

    By Ravenser,

    More of a brief note but - in between other distractions the layout has been up and run, and while it was out, I took the opportunity to sort out some outstanding electrical business
     
    The NCE PowerCab does not seem to have full short-circuit protection. I'm not sure of the technical details but I've finally installed some additional protection. This takes the form of a cheap and basic circuit breaker from Halfords, price £1.70 or so.
    http://www.maplin.co.uk/p/10a-auto-reset-circuit-breaker-ak07h?gclid=CPiBicHY5ccCFRI6Gwodp54PwQ
     
    As I understand it , the PowerCab doesn't shut off the juice in the event of a short. This little circuit breaker may not be a proper fast-acting breaker - those cost £20-30 - but it will turn the current off fairly quickly, limiting the time the PowerCab is exposed to any short. Instead of a screen full of gibberish and a reboot (pull out the plug, put it back in) you get a blank screen and a reboot . It's a damage limitation device , installed just behind the system socket on one wire of the feed into the traction bus
     
    While I was about it, I had a go at making the Kadee electromagnets work. When the layout was originally built , I installed three Kadee electromagnets beneath the track in the station - in a fit of enthusiasm for flash kit and clever tricks.
     
    I tried wiring one up ages ago - but nothing seemed to happen. I was under the impression that electromagnets were supposed to make a loud buzzing noise , and I assumed that the electrical joints were bad somewhere - presumably due to a failure adequately to strip the lacquer off the ends of the coil wire. (The lacquer made it impossible to perform the usual continuity test with the multimeter to check the joint - so I was stumped as to where the bad joint was). At that point I gave up...
     
     
    After a lapse of several years, I had a go at wiring the second electromagnet. I stripped back the lacquer using an emery board, carefully soldered up the joints, connected the transformer. No buzz.
     
    Then I noticed the coil was jolting when the button was pressed. This could not be mechanical action of the fine wire - and the coil was warm. We were in business. A check with a couple of parcels vans revealed that the electromagnets were effective. One remade joint later, and the electromagnetic uncouplers for both Platforms 1 & 2 were working
     
    (The transformer used is a switchable voltage DC power supply with a highest setting of 15V , which was being heavily discounted in Maplins a few years ago. It is rated for 5A at the lower voltages - no doubt a bit less at 15V. Kadee's recommendation is for 5A at 16V DC / 18V AC - my transformer gives a bit less than that , but it still seems to work)
     
    How much practical use these gadgets will be is a moot point. I installed them suitably placed to split 2 x 153 units , (or 153+Pacer) so they are too far down the platform to suit uncoupling a class 31, though they may suit a 128 unit. Practical experimentation is called for
  20. Ravenser
    The obvious thing to be done when you have a new model is to run the layout... So the 101 was given a thorough workout during a running session, just to make sure there were no hidden bugs
     
    :
     
    Tail traffic is an operational feature of the layout - the CCT will be attached to the outward working of the morning parcels. Hence DMUs need functional couplings. This gets in the way of full end detail, and I'm toying with the idea of giving the 114 fully detailed ends to use the Craftsman pack I have - when I finally get around to building the DC kit in my cupboard. The idea is that a 114 would be 2" longer , and therefore much less suitable for tacking CCTs and the like on the back of.. As it is, a short-frame DMU plus CCT just fits into Pl.1
     

     
    The Blue period engineer's train awaits running round. The Zander has had additional lead stuffed under it to ensure it behaves
     

     
    A busy scene at Blacklade.

     
    While I was about it, it suddenly occurred to me that DMUs do after all work in multiple , and I now have two low density 2 car DMUs of classes 101 and 108. Could they be consisted?
     
    Despite rather different mechanisms (Limby motor bogie and Bachmann motor bogie) it turned out that they could , quite comfortably. Admittedly the resulting 4 car formation is a squeeze into Pl.3 and is way too big for anywhere else , so it's not terribly practical. But I have a DC Kits 128 to do, and that would give me a very workable 3 car formation - so long as the Replica MLV chassis proves compatible with the other 2 units
     
    Along the way I discovered that the Bachmann/ESU decoders I fitted in the 108 don't support advanced consisting - just basic oldstyle consisting. So we now have Coupling Codes: Blue Square for units supporting only basic consisting, Red Triangle for compatible units supporting advanced consisting, Red Circle for second generation units with Limby motor bogie or compatible (Red Triangle and Red Circle units can physically work together, but it's inauthentic) , and Black Cross units - meaning the 158 which has a thoroughly uncompatible centre motor drive and no working couplings on the end.
     
    With a reworked 155 under way I should (hopefully) have another unit that can work with my two 153s, and then finally I start to get a variety of permutations for multiple unit working in the later period too.
  21. Ravenser
    There are so many things to sort out with this one it's difficult to know where to begin. I began with the trailer
     
    To my surprise and relief , when I removed the screws holding in place the Black Box on the underframe came off "just-like-that" , and it was empty . No messy sawing and cleaning up needed. Since the weight in this vehicle is all above the floor, there was no need to sort out alternative replacement weights. And if I ever feel bold enough to tackle my second 155 it should be possible to cut out the representational equipment box fronts for re-use, since further underframe castings are unlikely to be forthcoming.
     
    The enigmatic archery targets by the bogies were removed and replacement air tanks fabricated from Plastruct tubing with milliput stuck on each end and filed round when set. I had to buy an entire packet of Plastruct tubing - this should keep me in underframe airtanks for several lifetimes
     

     
    The interior mouldings are the same in both power and trailer cars, and so are the chassis mouldings and bogies. The interior therefore stops well short at both ends of the vehicle leaving vast empty zones in the ends. Remedial action is necessary - and the work done can be seen below. Obviously nothing can be done about the driving end on the power car: as you can see this is filled by the motor bogie. The only possible solution here would involve replacing the motor bogie with a Black Beetle, complete rebuilding of the bogies throughout, new trailing pickup arrangements and completely new pivot arrangements.
     
    The bogie pivot arrangements at the outer ends preclude carrying the floor right through the trailer . I cut away the projections on the bogie unit (which is the base of the power bogie with the mechanism left out) to allow extension of the floor on that side. Additional seating was cut from spare Hornby Mk4 interiors left from the Bratchill 150 project . Not an exact match but packed up to height with 20 thou styrene and painted suitably it is effective. Saloon end and toilet partitions are made from 40 thou styrene. On the trailer I used some Bratchill interior partitions for the cab partition and vestibule/saloon partition , then realised I will need to make replacements if I ever finish the power car on the 150. Photographic evidence for W Yorks Pacers shows red upholstery - so both interiors have been suitably painted with Humbrol acrylic crimson
     

     
    The satellite half of an Express Models 155 lighting kit has been installed running along the vehicle roof (and through cutouts in the cab end bulkheads). A hole for the plug/socket has been drilled out and removed at the base of the gangway
     
    Kadees (number 42 - medium overset with 1 mounting shim) have been fitted to the outer ends . So far the trailer car has a medium underset Kadee at the inner end - there is no need to observe the Kadee height standard on a coupling internal within the vehicle
     
    The biggest and nastiest job is the one I didn't manage to duck - flush-glazing. Nobody does flushglazing for a 155 or is ever likely to - so I had to do it the hard way - remove the glazing strip, cut it into pieces, and file them down until the window glazing fits into the aperture. To minimise any damage to the surface of the glazing during the long and tedious process of filing down I applied sellotape over the raised section of the glazing. In one case - I still don't know why - a small crack appeared in the bottom of the glazing , visible when seen from one direction. The filed-down glazing was held in place by running gloss varnish thickly round the frame of the window aperture with a small brush , then pressing the glazing into place from behind
     
    This took over a week of work, three or four windows at a time - and that's for only 1 vehicle out of 2. There are 60 windows in the sides of a 2 car 155 unit
     
    Yes, it's a big improvement. It has to be, for the effort. And now I'm committed to doing the same with the Pacers, which only makes it worse.
     
    (One additional point - before removing the glazing it was necessary to cut through the downward projections, and glue them in place on the bodyshell using solvent run in under capillary action, very cautiously. This is necessary because these projections contain recesses into which the body-retaining lugs on the chassis fit.
     
    I laid the glazing in the bodyshell overnight - next day I noticed that one strip had become slightly clouded in 2 places. I don't know why , and a coat of gloss varnish on the back was only a partial fix. The final effect is of 3 dirty windows - not perfect but not a disaster. Windows did/do occasionally get coated with a scurf, presumably in the carriage wash, but I could have done without this weathering effect)
     
    The fight goes on...
  22. Ravenser
    We left matters with a part-fixed Limby DMU and a mild crisis of conscience about details, identities and my general rate of progress on things in general.
     
    Happily the 101 does not add to the latter as it's now finished - despite all the little extras that kept crawling out.
     
    The first little catch was when looking at various photos in Morrison's DMU book and online. Whatever the faults of the former as a piece of scholarship (The Railcar Association compiled 9 pages of errata to it, and I only managed to print off 3 of them before the Railcar website disappeared for protracted and extensive rebuilding like a medieval cathedral), a photo's a photo and dates are normally reliable. Lima produced 101s with both the early 4 cab marker lights and the later 2 + lower 2 digit code panel. What Hornby did not issue was a DMU with 2 marker lights, one over each buffer , and plated headcode box - which is what happened after their refurbishment in the late 70s /early 80s.
     
    This had to be fixed - which meant out with the Xurons and crunch , followed by a good deal of rubbing down with emery boards. Patch painting was also needed, and since Hornby's yellow is a bit orange this meant tinting the Precision Paints post 84 yellow with a spot of Royal Mail red (Railmatch - and to hand from work on the NRX). Since the coats showed further rubbing down was needed, and since yellow takes about 3 coats to cover adequately, this was fun and games - especially with all the colour-matching by eye .
     
    I chickened out on a full repaint because I doubted I'd get near Sandakan's finishing with 3 brush coats, there was a risk of getting on glazing and other areas it shouldn't be , difficulties with achieving neat boundaries and avoiding bits of the old colour showing through at edges and elsewhere. What I did do was give a thin wash over the rest of the cab end with surplus paint (I was painting ends alternately) and apply a satin varnish with a drop of Precision yellow. This should blend everything and knock back the orange tint a little - and it seems to work.
     
    Somewhere in all this I managed to ping off one of the plastic windscreen wipers and a micro-wormhole in the carpet swallowed it. It will probably re-emerge under the headboard of the bed in another room in 6 years time. The plastic wipers aren't great - but I now had to replace them anyway, a job I'd been hoping to avoid. I managed to find an etch of wipers from A1 Models and fitted a pair at both ends, as this seemed to match what was shown by 1980s photos. I know have my own photographic evidence of two refurbished 3 car 101 sets in the E Midlands in 1981 with single wipers so this obviously wasn't a standard change at refurbishment , but is probably correct. Whether the wipers used are entirely correct I'm not sure - but they're much finer than the original plastic and also the right colour
     

     
    The plastic gangways were replaced - I was lucky to have the rest of a packet of MJT British Standard gangways , part of which had already been used for the Ratio LNW set. This time I needed to use the cast whitemetal bases, and I made up new faceplates from 20 thou plasticard, using the gaps in the etch where the original etched plates had been as a template for the scriber. I now have proper touching gangways .
     
    A thin wash of blue-grey Humbrol wash mixed with dark brown wash was applied to the roof and the gloss shine subsequently removed with matt varnish.
     
    A little blue-grey wash with a touch of brown , heavily thinned was applied to the sides and any surplus drawn off with the brush to tone down the finish and blend in the transfers and patch painting . The wash also picked out the door lines, and I dry brushed the hinges with a little dirty black. Inner ends received a couple of wash coats of the blue-grey wash
     
    The underframe was given a wash coat of Railmatch frame dirt
     
    One major issue I ducked was the underframe "black box". I would certainly have had a go if the front bogie wasn't being held together by superglue , and liable to fail if subjected to the stresses of repeated disassembly and reassembly. The "black box" on this unit isn't bad actually - there's only a small area of plastic that shouldn't really be there , and for some time I couldn't work out how it could be cut away anyway. Enlightenment dawned when I saw a posting on another forum. Lateral thinking - or at least lateral cutting - is required. The black box is cut along its length, behind the moulded detail , leaving a thin "façade" on each side , then you file out the bits that shouldn't be there and build up the various boxes behind.
     
    But , as I said, because there is a patched glue repair on the power car I've ducked it for the moment. What I might do , however, is experiment with the "spare" chassis removed from the trailer when converting it from DMCL to DTCL. I could then relatively quickly convert to a power twin set if I ever wanted simply by swapping the interior and bogies from trailer to power chassis moulding and clipping it back into the bodyshell (The trailer car numbering would then be wrong, but how many people would notice?)
     
    What I did do was adopt a bodge mentioned on Jim Smith-Wright's P4 Newstreet website. This consists of painting the few bits of plastic that shouldn't be there with matt black - at which point the underframe equipment stands out and the spurious areas merge back into the shadow under the vehicle . He found it sufficiently effective that it was several years before he got round to doing the full underframe rework, and as the photos show it's quite successfu
     
    I reassembled everything , tested it quickly , then decided to remove the capacitor to improve slow speed running . Having snipped off the beige blob, I decided to remove the wires back beyond the collar . This was a serious mistake - when I put the chassis back on the track, it was dead as a doornail. Panic!
     
    Further inspection revealed not one but two loose wires. The horrible realisation dawned - the capacitor was soldered directly to the motor terminals along with the feed wires, and in wielding the Xurons to take out the remains of the capacitor I had also neatly cut the wires off the motor terminals.....
     
    Having dropped out the motor bogie (it's held into the chassis frame by a screw from above) I managed to resolder the wires to where they are supposed to be and we were back in business.
     
    It's now been cleaned, oiled and thoroughly tested through a full operating session after a proper running in session on club test tracks (something it never got when originally bought). Performance is pretty satisfactory, though not quite as good as other units with the same motor bogie but no traction tyres
     
    That, I think, constitutes a result

  23. Ravenser
    Blacklade is in the North Midlands, with services to Birmingham, Nottingham and Sheffield via Chesterfield. The latter either extends through to Leeds or is worked by W Yorkshire units.
     
    In the 1980s this means that 3 depots would obviously supply units - Derby Etches Park (DY), Lincoln (LN) and Tyesley (TS). Oddly South Yorkshire never had a DMU depot, despite being a fully fledged PTE - their units came either from Lincoln or Neville Hill (NL). There is a minor metaphysical issue about Etches Park, since Blacklade and Hallamshire replace Derby and Derbyshire in the scheme of things, and Blacklade is not on the main line nor a major rail centre. I assume the Midland had their headquarters at Nottingham , their main works at Toton, and where the alternate for Etches Park depot ends up in this parallel reality is anyone's guess (Chesterfield? Burton? Long Eaton? Ilkeston? Swanwick?))
     
    Lincoln had the 114s - all of them - and some 105s. Etches Park (which sounds like it should have had a pile of Craftsman conversion kits and Comet sides) had 3 car 120s until they were replaced by the first production Sprinters of Class 150/1 in 1985. That leaves Tyseley and Neville Hill as potential homes for my 101.
     
    TS looked the obvious candidate till I got out my various ABCs for the period. TS was an exponent of hybrid sets, and when I hunted through the numbers I could not find any pairs of DMBS + DTCL on their books in the period. In 1988 they had DMBS M53222 on the books (scrapped by 1992) but no DTCL. The first relevant listing of TS formations I have is the 1992 Platform 5 volume, when 101 DMCL 53242 was working with 116 DMBS 53073. Even finding 3 car 101 formations to match the original Hornby set was tough although I found M53303/M59124/M53328 all allocated in 1988. No idea if they were in the same set though. TS doesn't work for my 101 unit
     
    Hornby's W-prefix numbers are taken from a photo in Morrison's book of a 3 car Canton unit C813 at Cheltenham Spa in 1982 (p56, bottom). That won't do either - such a unit would not have got past New Street.
     
    At this stage we are down to Neville Hill. You then start hunting through books and looking at photos , and realising that a lot of power/trailer sets were allocated to Chester (CH), Heaton, Hull Botanic Gardens (BG) , Cambridge (CA) and Norwich Crown Point (NC) , and are out of contention. A photo in Morrison just above the one Hornby used shows the end of DTCL E54218 at Leeds in 1983.My books show it allocated to NL in late summer 83 and still there in 85-6, having survived the arrival of the 141s. That's a start. The caption claims it has S Yorks PTE branding , which would be great - but MetroTrain was W Yorks PTE's branding. 101s definitely worked into Sheffield from Leeds - these will have been Neville Hill units - and definitely worked Sheffield- Doncaster: those must also have been NL units
     
    A hunt for a suitable companion found DMBS E51250, also at NL on both dates. Since NL does not seem to have maintained fixed unit formations it's anyone's guess whether they were paired - but you can't prove I'm wrong, either.
     
    The yellow stripe is an issue. Another photo notes the abolition of first class in W Yorks in 1983 - with a TCL which has been downgraded to TSL and lost it's stripe. However abolition of first in W Yorks would not affect units supplied for S Yorks PTE services (On the other hand the People's Republic of South Yorkshire in the 80s might have thought a tumbril to the guillotine a more appropriate vehicle for first class passengers. When BR reintroduced the Master Cutler a few years later as a Pullman, Sheffield City Council officially objected to the new service and called for its withdrawal as elitist.). I found a photo of DTCL E54365 on a Sheffield service around 1990 , with double arrows but no yellow stripe - as I couldn't find an obvious DMBS partner , that was a non-starter, too
     
    Another point which I missed - never overlook your own resources . It was only when I was compiling this - well after I'd finished -
    that I remembered I had this photo. Slightly tweaked as to brightness, contrast and colour for the occasion and with a sharpening tool applied to mitigate its photographic awfulness:
     

     
    In December 1981 we flew back from Sydney for contract leave over Christmas. Dad hired a car at Heathrow, and when we got home he was somewhat frustrated to find that the car hire company's nearest return point was Nottingham - especially as the weather had taken a turn for the worse. So we drove to Nottingham , and I got the rare treat of a train ride back from Nottingham Midland on a freezing day (The rare treat of a train ride on BR that is - train rides on the NSWGR were available for the price of a mile and a half walk to and from the station with some fairly steep hills on the way, and a 30 cent day return)
     
    This was taken at Lincoln St Marks - the 3 car 101 on the left had just brought us from Nottingham. From the fact we were hanging about on the platform at St Marks for me to take photos I think we were waiting to connect into a Newark Northgate - Grimsby train to take us to Market Rasen.
     
    (For younger readers - in those days Lincoln Central could not be reached off the Newark/Nottingham line, which continued through St Marks, over the High Street about 100 yards south of the surviving crossing , and joined the GC Lincoln-Barnetby line at Durham Ox, a few hundred yards east of Central station, just before you passed Lincoln DMU depot. A new connection into Central via the northern part of the former Lincoln Avoiding Line was opened in mid 1985 and St Marks and the last mile or so of the MR route into Lincoln closed. A facinating glimpse of St Marks in its MR heyday can be seen here: http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/30999-lincoln-st-marks-engine-shed/&do=findComment&comment=1624075)
     
    The salient point here is a comparison of the cab ends with these on the Lima model:
     

     
    Both 101s - presumably based at Derby Etches Park and certainly refurbished (a shot taken at Nottingham before departure shows the lefthand 101 in blue/grey) - retain the original single windscreen wiper, despite my belief these were incorrect for the 80s. The lamp irons are quite noticeable - against my decision not to try fitting the Craftsman ones. And I'm quite certain that the destination boxes are significantly deeper than Lima's letterbox slots. I couldn't get Worksop or Derby from Charlie Petty's sheet into the Lima boxes (Not that I'd have used Derby since Blacklade replaces Derby ) Here DERBY fits with room to spare despite being a much larger font than DONCASTER which only just fits vertically in the box on the model
     
    The reason for this is something raised by other modellers and quite clear in this comparison : the cab windows on the Lima model are rather too tall and more like those of a Derby unit (Yes I know I said these two 101s are probably Derby units. Just not that sort of Derby unit...)
     
    All of this is way beyond my ability to correct and I haven't attempted it.
     
    The difference in yellow is more complex. The Hornby yellow is definitely too orange, though I've toned it down a bit with washes and varnish. But it's not as orange in normal light as it appears here, and it represents the post '84 Warning Panel Yellow , which was a more orange shade. The DMUs in the photo are displaying the pre '84 yellow , which was a paler, more lemon shade .
     
    PS
    (By the way, it's very sobering to read this , when checking back down the blog to make sure I've got the tags right .
     
    http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/blog/296/entry-5627-ive-started-so-ill-finish/
     
    Sorting out the 101 was then a pending job, possibly later that year, as the bits were in hand. That was four and a half years ago. Painting the interior of the 108 and weathering was seen as a quick win for the near future. It's still seen as a quick win for the near future
     
    The Pacer had one brief splutter of progress about 2 years ago . I have hopes of doing something about it later in the year. The Bratchill 150 is indefinitely stalled. Realtrack still haven't got round to a 144 in earlier W.Yorks livery .
     
    The loco-hauled replacement set is a reality. So, as of last autumn , is the upgraded Airfix 31. The Cambrian Dogfish and Shark mentioned are built and in traffic . It only took almost 4 years . So is the LNW set
     
    Some of the rest could be reposted....
     
     
    And I'm shocked to think how long the resin WD road van and DOGACOV B have been pending)
     
    http://www.ourcivilisation.com/smartboard/shop/johnsons/idler/chap88.htm
  24. Ravenser

    West Yorkshire Sow's Ear - 1 : Diagnosis

    By Ravenser,


    Constructional
    I have two Hornby 155s sitting in the pile of stock boxes
     
    One is in Regional Railways livery. I've had it for at least 15 years and it's never run. It was meant as material for converting into 153s to support a proposed club layout project which never happened
     
    The other is in West Yorkshire red and white . This was acquired as a modest priced placeholder for a later club layout project (which got as far as running bare boards and some scenery before it died ). It has a decoder (a Macoder if you ask), it's run , and as Blacklade is supposed to have services south from West Yorkshire via Sheffield, its perfectly in place. Since the thing actually ran quite well, it was a regular on the layout until I installed Knightwing point motors (the dummy prototype sort cast in whitemetal) . These fouled the "black box" on the underframe, so the unit was stopped.
     
    As the packets of NNK/MTK underframe castings have turned up, and as the 101 is now done, and the Kirk Gresley 51' pigeon van well advanced, attention has turned to the poor old W.Yorks 155 while I still have some modelling time. I want at least to get this started , and resuscitation turned from a good intention into an actual project.
     
    Sorting out the various RTR DMUs and their shortcomings has always been a good intention for the future. However with the 101 done, we move on to the next. The W Yorks 158 is in their later livery and not really suitable for an "early period" sequence set in 1985-90. The 155 is eminently suitable.
     
    The Hornby, (ex Dapol) 155 dates from around 1990, and has not been in the catalogue for a few years now. It's quite probable Hornby will never produce it again. It's not a great model, dating from a time when OO RTR was much more basic than would be tolerated nowadays, and originated by a company whose standards were some distance behind the cutting edge at the time . It was the least worst of the 3 modern multiple units Dapol produced in the Dave Boyle era - the Dapol Pendolino was a crude lemon beside its excellent rival the Bachmann Voyager, and the Dapol 150 is a model that is spoken of with a shudder when old modern image modellers sit in the pub by the fire and tell of the terrible hardships they endured in their youth. Hornby seem to have chucked the tooling for those two in the skip (where it belonged) but they re-ran the 155 for a number of years with a decent finish and an improved mechanism.
     
    However it's considerably cruder than the 156 they inherited from Lima , and since only 7 units survive, owned by West Yorkshire , the rest being converted to 153s in 1990-2, its commercial potential is pretty limited.
     
    For these reasons it is most unlikely anyone will ever produce another RTR model . Like the EM2s, it's been stranded by the tide of history. Unlike the EM2s, it's never going to be iconic. It's a grubby middle-weight Sprinter.
     
    And next to a Hornby 153 (like wot I've got ...) it looks rough.
     
    There's so much wrong with this model that simply listing the issues is going to be quite enough for a substantial post. I'm not aiming at "the definitive 155". Assuming anyone could ever be bothered to attempt it, you wouldn't go this route . It has been suggested that a 155 can be converted from two Hornby 153s - a sort of reverse version of what BR did. However that would cost you at least £200 in raw materials, and assuming a professional paint job is required, the bill will be close to £300.There would also be the fun and games of hacking the chassis and consisting two separate mechanisms requiring two decoders. Money is tight, and even if I could source 2 x 153 it's not on for lots of reasons. I'm not that desperate for a perfect 155.
     
    So this is an attempt to patch up the unit I have , at minimal cost using stuff I have in stock, and tackle the shortcomings as far as I sensibly can.
     
    Here's a picture of the trailer car dismantled to help you spot the problems:

     
    Starting at the bottom - the black boxes on the underframe have to go : not only are they very wrong, the model is out of gauge with them. Fortunately this isn't going to be too hard, as can be seen.
     
    The tension-locks go and Kadees need to be fitted. I'm hoping I will be able to consist this unit with a 153 - the mechanical mismatch between a Limby motor bogie and a big Bachmann centre motor drive having proved impossible. This also means close coupling to minimise the Straits of Dover between the two vehicles.
     
    Unfortunately it's not going to be possible to fit working gangways and eliminate the gap completely. I have an Express Models lighting kit - arguably lights are needed on a second generation DMU and they are certainly an operator's convenience. These kits rely on wiring through from the power car, and they recommend you route the cable and plugs through a hole in the gangway between the vehicles. That's incompatible with fitting a paper bellows gangway. The Kadees would be in the way if I tried routing it below the gangway. And it looks very much as if the gangways are a little too narrow anyway. I wouldn't be surprised to find that the whole unit is 1-2mm too narrow, and that they've lost it in the gangways. (I have a decent scale side elevation drawing from Railnews Stockspot, but no scale drawings of the end from which to check).
     
    There is no solebar. The bodyside has been continued right the way down to the bottom of the chassis, and no doubt panel proportions have been played about with in the vertical axis (I said it wasn't up to modern standards...) . I gather the traditional fix for this was to paint a "fake solebar" along the bottom edge of the bodyshell
     
    Ploughs will be fitted , as I have some. Correct from the mid to late 90s but not in 1987-91. So ok when running in a "late period" running session (2000-06) but not for "early" (1985-90)
     
    The interior is incomplete. On the power car this is because the motor bogie fills up the driving end and the start of the passenger saloon. The only way you could address that would be to scrap the existing mechanism and replace with a Black Beetle and dummy at a cost of about £65, which is a step further than I'm prepared to go. There's a vast gaping hole in the floor at the cab end of the trailer, because they've used the same chassis moulding for power car and trailer car. For reasons which escape me, they've left out any interior at the inner ends as well - the seat moulding stops one window before the end of the passenger saloon and the rest of the vehicle is empty , so you can see straight through to the end doors on the other side.
     
    Providing extra seats and partitions at the inner ends is easy enough. On the trailer car I can fit partitions behind the cab and behind the vestibule , and extend the seating forward by one window : unfortunately because of the way the bogie is pivoted and retained at the sides it's not possible simply to extend the floor all the way, and nothing but complete reconstruction of the chassis at this end, with a totally restructured bogie and an entirely new pivot and retention arrangement would address that. Again, this kind of drastic rebuilding is further than I'm prepared to go: the more modest work will address most of the problem, and a one window gap in the trailer car seating will have to be lived with.
     
    It looks as if there should be clear plastic covers on the gangway doors at the cab ends . One or two shots show a yellow plate (eg 155 341), but generally the cover is clear but frequently very dirty. If it's dirty , it will conceal the wires running up from the Express Models lighting. I'm not renumbering - Sandakan's quality of finish is very good indeed and for my purposes one W Yorks 155 is as good as another.
     
    The final issue - and a major one - is the glazing. The real things are flush-glazed. So are Hornby's 153s. The ex Dapol 155 is not, with very obvious ledges at the windows. The glazing comes out easily enough , but the only way I can see of fixing the problem is to cut out each pane individually and slightly oversize then file to a fit and fix . I am going to give it a first shot on the door windows , where the recess looks particularly bad - if that works , then I may be up for doing all 44 windows in the passenger saloons
     
    As far as I'm aware there's no replacement glazing available from any source
     
    If anyone knows how this problem has been tackled by anyone in the past, I'd appreciate the info. If the work is really too difficult or securing too uncertain I might have to leave the main saloon windows as is , but it's a big visual issue , and I'd really like to avoid that
  25. Ravenser

    Damage Control - 1

    By Ravenser,


    Constructional
    I had good intentions, but somehow a 101 didn't feature in them...
     
    I've got a 101 - I've had it for years. A Limby 3 car 101 in blue/grey was one of the things acquired in the RTR buying spree when I started building Blacklade a few years ago. Being ex Lima and a dowdy Modernisation unit it was rather looked down on as a quick placeholder. After all Bachmann would no doubt displace the Limby model with a splendid state of the art model in a few years
     
    Then the power car took a tumble, resulting in the pivot pin of the trailing bogie fracturing and detaching. A panic-stricken repair with superglue took a turn for the worse when I noticed I'd managed to get a superglue mark on both sides of the bodyshell. A hasty attempt to patch paint the mark with an elderly tin of what was supposed to be BR Grey only left it looking much worse. I then found the repaired bogie left one end sitting about 1.5mm high. At which point the wretched thing was bundled back into its box and buried under other stock.
     
    Where it remained for 4 or 5 years. I managed to source some better rail grey point, and also a spare trailer chassis frame and power car chassis frame, along with a pair of what were supposed to be class 101 bogies . But nothing was actually done. The list of jobs to be done was long and resuscitating one mediocre RTR DMU when I have a perfectly good 108 wasn't near the top of it.
     
    Having some modelling time available I thought about patching up the bodyshell damage. I dug out a copy of the shortlived MRM magazine which featured an article by Rich Bucknall on a simple conversion to a 2 car power-trailer unit . This seemed very quick and simple - and had always been on the cards as 3 cars is really a bit awkward on Blacklade.
     
    So one Thursday evening the poor thing was dug out of its box. An emery board and the 1500 flexgrit soon cleaned down the small damaged area on the DMBS bodyshell, and a little Precision Paints Rail Grey made a good job of touching in. It looked like repair might be a success. On the other side damage was confined to the glazing on one window - and after a little scraping with a finger nail , essentially confined to one quarterlight on that window. A little gloss varnish patched that .
     
    The chassis was robbed from the TCL for use under the second driving vehicle to turn it into a DTCL. The exhaust pipes on this were pulled out.
     
    And at this point it all started to get a bit more complicated....
     
    Firstly the holes left by the exhaust needed to be filled (Squadron green putty did the job) and patch-painted (Railmatch BR acrylic was to hand and was a reasonable match) . Not a problem
     
    Then the interior needed painting . That took a good deal longer than it sounds . Seats blue - except in First which was left unpainted to represent the faded gold upholstered armchairs one found there. Duckegg blue is a decent representation of the pale blue-green formica that featured in many Modernisation Plan DMUs , but which bits are duck-egg blue and which bits should be brown is a bit more complicated and I'm not sure I've left as much brown as I should. The interior needed populating - a raid on the figures box managed to cover that. Drivers were added at each end - Springside I think.
     
    At this point I realised there was no drivers' desk on the TCL interior - which by this stage was nicely painted and peopled for the DTCL. I had to cut it off the moulding I had swapped into the centre car, and fix in place on the DTCL interior
     
    The interior of the cab end glazing was painted dark grey where it is between the windows - this greatly reduced the prism effect round the edge of the cab windows
     
    One end of the DMBS was sitting about 1.5mm high because of the bodged repair . I was under the impression it was the chassis frame that had been damaged, but in fitting and removing the interior - to discover that the problem only manifested itself when the interior was clipped in - the repair to the pivot pin failed and I found out exactly what the problem was
     
    The bogie had to be stripped down - neither Humbrol solvent nor Plastic Weld would touch this plastic - and a rather better repair made with Hafix thick superglue. To avoid any repeat fracture I did not plug the bogie back into its hole until very late in proceedings , and I countersank the hole in the interior moulding underneath (using a craft knife) and opened it out with a rat-tail file, since clearly the top of the pivot pin had been fouling against this since the initial repair
     
    When Hornby retooled the power car chassis to take the new Limby motor bogie, they provided NEM pockets on the bogies. However the underframes on the non-powered cars remained exactly as Lima tooled them, complete with great big old style tension-locks . Those had to go and the hoops were trimmed off with Xurons . A suitable platform was left to mount replacement Kadees - I used #27 medium underset , with a single shim underneath, glued in place with a nylon Kadee screw taken through from the top and cut off below as a peg to anchor them. (These were obtained from Charlie Petty at Railex)
     
    This improves the front end appearance no end
     
    I also found a Craftsman DMU detailing pack . There were enough buffers for a 3 car unit - so I replaced the Lima buffers at the cab ends , since the Craftsman buffers looked a bit bigger - but left the buffers at the inner ends, which are less obvious. I still have enough buffers for a 2 car unit.
     
    However it became apparent that I could not fit the cast jumper cable connections , or buffer bean pipeworth as they would foul the swing of the bogie- mounted Kadees. Since I run parcels tail traffic - and it would be nice to work a DMU in multiple occasionally - Kadees are essential. As and when I build the parcels unit I could form up a 3 car rake, and with a considerable squeeze it may just be possible to run a 4 car short underframe set (101 + 108)
     
    A shot of the bits at this stage of proceedings is attached:
     

     
    Then I made the mistake of getting out the books to research a prototype identity , and things got more complicated......
×
×
  • Create New...