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Matthew Cousins

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  1. Matthew Cousins

    Vinyl solution 2

    By Matthew Cousins,

    Having the sun out today meant that I could get a better pic of the vinyls, so here we are.
    With a bit of varnish and weathering this could be a reasonable solution for me, as I'm not that picky about uber details.
    This solution is not for he purist, but I really don't have the time for learning tedious lining techniques - too busy.
  2. Matthew Cousins
    I bought a 7mm G5 that had no lining and poor transfers, so using my loco profiles computer images I thought that I would create a set of vinyls for it, as my local printer can now print sticky backed vinyls that will be able to take spray varnish.
    They will need to be fudged in a bit and the loco weatherd to disguise the printed matter, but thought it hadn't turned out too badly.
    I have also done a set for my Stroudley liveried Terrier, but not stuck them on yet as that will take a lot more effort.
    Pic show the loco before any disguising work has been done, but is a bit grainy due to no real daylight today in Sussex.
    The footplate lining will be done with the next printing
  3. Matthew Cousins
    Hi, I just thought that I would clarify a misunderstanding on one of our contributors, who suggested that I had got the tender front wrong on this A4 build. He said that the streamlined tenders were straight at the front and not curved in. Well in fact all the corridor tenders were curved in at the front not just the 1928 built and modified. The Corridor type tender fills out the loading gauge, so that any handrail on the outside would be out of gauge, so all the fronts had to be curved in to mount the handrail.
    Only the streamlined NON corridor tenders were straight at the front as on Mallard as preserved. People may also note that ALL of the Bachmann 0 gauge NON corridor tenders are the wrong width as they are the same width as the corridor type and should be narrower. I found that an old Skinley drawing is responsible for this error and when I bought an A3 that had been built to these drawings with a wide non-corridor tender, I had to convert the tender, by adding the corridor details, see pic attached.
    I hope that this clears things up, but sorry to all those with Bachmann 0 gauge A3's, who now should set about narrowing their non corridor and GN coal rail tenders!Thanks for the comment, it was useful I think to air the subject which is confusing, as Bachmann know to their cost!
  4. Matthew Cousins
    I am starting this blog at somewhat of a halfway stage to give a warning to anyone starting to mess about with a Bachmann A3 chassis!
    Having had a cast white metal A4 body lying around for some time I came up with a novel idea to get this on a chassis from a Bachmann A3 that I picked up for £365, whilst saving the body and tender of the A3 to form the basis of a P1 2-8-2 (Gresleys freight Mikado version of the A1/A3 pacifics)
    Later on I shall show progress on both these engines where for an outlay of around £700 I can make both a P1 2-8-2 and an A4 4-6-2, but for this posting I shall pass on my experiences with the A3 chassis for the A4.
    Taking the basic Bachmann A3 chassis, I thought that I could improve the valve gear and replace the coupling rods and eccentric etc.
    Having taken the rods off I found that I couldn't re-attach the pins as it was not possible to get the pins relocated on the wheels without taking the force fit wheels off their axles and ruining the quartering and probably ending up with wobbly loose wheels.
    So now what? I had a set of Slaters driving wheels acquired with some issues of the 'Build the Flying Scotsman' partwork ( I wonder how many odd sets of these partworks are still lying about!) and looking at the axles on the Bachmann A3 thought that it would be a simple job to replace the wheels - HOW WRONG I WAS !!
    The nicely sprung axleboxes that I thought had an axle approximating to a Slaters axle passing thorough them had in fact got a reduced diameter axle at the ends to which not only the wheels a force fitted but also concealed in that nice sprung axlebox was a ball bearing race! - I can hear comments of 'he should have checked this first...more money than sense...etc etc'.
    As can be seen from the photos I was now in a real mess, nothing of the Slaters axles fits this lot!
    So I felt the only way to rescue this was to fit plain bearings into the axleboxes by boring out the axle hole and aralditing in the plain bearings - I am a terrible bodger but managed to achieve an acceptable result, only to find out that some company makes roller bearings that fit Slaters axles I think.
    The motor/gearbox was much more of a problem as I couldn't force off the ball race and so had to saw this axle up to release the gear cog to put on the Slaters axle and had to get a friend to turn up a spacer to accommodate the plain bearing in the gearbox otherwise it would have meant throwing the whole motor/gearbox away and buying my preferred ABC items, but I was determined to save a bit of money!
    So please look at the photos attached and probably the best advice is NOT to touch the wheels of these early Bachmann A3's at all but just tidy up the radius link and die block on the valve gear some other way!!
    Having said that I am pleased with the improvement to the appearance of the wheels and I can now fit proper valvegear and the quartering will never be a problem!
  5. Matthew Cousins
    Although my layout is an LNER main line, the wayside station has a group of LBSCR preservationists using the old loco shed.
    Having presented the Gladstone to the LNER railway museum, they have gone on to preserve other LBSCR locos and have recently got their G class single nearly complete.
    They rolled it out into the sunshine - alarmingly without buffers! and had some pics taken. Thanks to Pete Wisdom for the build after taking on a part built scratch build for me and to Ian Hopkins for lining.

  6. Matthew Cousins
    The pre-Christmas Reading Trade show, did me in again, as I couldn't resist buying this part made E4 from a friendly trader.
    It has been very nicely made, but needs the loco chassis assembling - a task that friend Colin has undertaken to help me with! He assures me that the Alan Gibson cast wheels can be made useable even though the insulated wheels are turning on their axles.
    The E4 had always been on my long term list to get, so I felt that this was very opportune!
    I managed to sell a surplus tank loco to fund half of the purchase, so not too far out of pocket.
     

     
    Also friend Peter came along to show me how far the A1 (that he's building me from a David Andrews kit) is coming along.
    Hopefully this will be finished in spring 2016 - I can't wait!
     

  7. Matthew Cousins
    The B12 has now been finish painted by Colin Tyler and weathered by the local chap The Weathering Service.

    The E 4 has been lettered and lined by Colin Tyler, after basic painting by me (Halfords Satin Black) but will not be weathered as the prototype was kept as a pet by Cambridge shed as station pilot in the 1930's.

    Both taken on the inside part of the layout when the evening sun shines in.
  8. Matthew Cousins
    After about 5 years, the build of this David Andrews A1 kit has been completed by Peter Relf for me and a very nice job too.
    Will require a little fettling to put up with the vagaries of my outdoor track (it is compensated/sprung) but the wait has been worth it!

    We had a debate about the BR Express blue and I found a BS colour called 'Roundel Blue' that I think looks good, but this livery is always one for debate as regards the blue.

    The next stage will be very light weathering as apart from ex-works locos got grubby quickly at this time in the early 1950's.
    So for these pics on the set of Peter Cowling Pullmans it's in pristine condition, just ex-works.

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