dj_crisp

Thanks! The more I look at the 56 (which end up as 56101 Mutual Improvement) the more I'm tempted with respraying the upper grey as it looks a bit too dark to me. Thing is I'm also thinking of sorting out the front grille so before i know it I'll end up respraying the lot in a harder why they stripping it in the first place. Doh!

As it's nice and sunny I thought I'd paint some grey.... Pleased with how the 56 grey has come out... removed Hornby's green tint with railmatch grey. Also added are air conditioning vents and some lifting covers. Next up will be sorting the side grilles out and I'm getting more tempted to have a go at the front horn grille too. And when you right mess up a respray.... start again... well in this case it's just the side which has my first attempt sanded off, re-primed with white and then railmatch grey applied. Very mild weathering started (this one will intentionally look clean) and a coat of varnish applied - this has really evened out the original finish nicely (especially the logos) and covers where I've removed the previous transfers with T-Cut. It now awaits a new lighting circuit (from express models as life is too short), laser glazing and I might add some wipac light etches to try and improve the front head lights. Oh and remove the GPS thingy from the air horns. Hopefully a nice easy project! Right off to enjoy the sunshine Happy Modelling Will

I kinda have to be interested in trackwork otherwise I'll have no where to run my models. LOL. Not sure what your point is. I'll get my coat.

Looks a great issue Stephen! Cheers Will

Interesting thoughts! I'm bashing my Bachmann Mk1s around and am beginning to think it'll have been easier to kitbuild front the start!

If you don't have tight curves I abandon the close coupling mech and mount the kadee on the body rather than the bogie.

A riveting post lee

Nope as I don't read the Mail but two issues i fully support. I will admit DM is very easy to sneer at.

Hmmm.... from a paper living in the dark ages I'm surprised they not running a piece on a fears that your heads going to fall off due to the speed of these new fangled steam engines.

Messing about with lighting becomes a bit addictive I know my efforts arent perfect but it's very satisfying improving the standard setup. Switchable (on/off) tail lights are a must for me. 57 looks spot on

Think that was a bit of an own goal by Hornby tbh. I'll pay zero attention to future announcements from now on.

I've not had a go at a 45 but my approach would be the same as what I do for my Mk1s, 60 & 66s. Hack a hole (well carfully cut a slot), use a 252 and i tend to slice it flat (chop the circle and lip off). Then use plasticard 4mm rod as spacers.... drill a 2mm hole into the rod and then use either a 8ba or 10ba nut and bolt to attach it to the chassis through a 2mm hole (or smaller for the 10ba). The bolt is secured with a spot of loctite This allows me to have fun front end detailing and the cut slot prevents the kadee rotating I'm not sure the photos of my 66 help help but gives you an idea (the mk1 kadees are on my workbence thread) I don't know if I'll ever need to change the kadees but they able to be dismantled if needed. The 66 is very tight fit and needs some of the bogie plastic trimmed down but works allowing full bogie rotation. cheers Will

After looking at my previous photos and finding a few prototype shots of the Regional Railways BSK that I'm attempting to model I realised that I'd put the distributor on the wrong end.... so while I was swapping it around I also remembered that i had some distributors which were intended for some PTA tippers. These are now fitted and the size does look a bit better. (For some reason they're yellow but i remembered them being white! All wiring is 0.5mm wire. The next time i might use a thinner wire but think it looks ok. I've started on the base weathering and using painted the door frames black using capillary action. TBH it looks a little heavy to me whereas the TSO I'm doing along side looks much better. I'm just after a used looking coach so don't want to do much on the sides. Next up is ETH fittings, which are in clear plastic at the moment. And a few wires (0.33mm & 0.5mm) which have been fitted to suggest something is going on. I've actually glued a micro magnet in one of the ETH fittings and plan to play with having working connectors - we shall see if that works! If it doesn't I'll fit some wire instead. Not much more to do on the underframe - I've ordered some air brake cylinders from S kits so when they arrive I'll be able to finish off the underframe and fit some steps. And the interior has been crudely painted - hopefully this won't matter too much when it's all put back together. cheers Will

Agreed.... but I don't think there is an alternative option? I might chop a bit more of the Base off so they sit a little higher on my next attempt.

More than does the job.... looks fantastic!!

Thanks Martin and all for your help... I've started on bashing the underframe about a bit.... http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/100546-wills-1990ish-projects/?p=3137435 If there is anything really wrong please let me know!! cheers Will

Back to coaches! This is going to be a dual fitted MK1 BSK and so I've attacked it with a Masokits underframe detailing kit. I've soldered the Masokits bits as i find that easier than gluing and things have gone together well If it all looks a bit wonky and not square its because i haven't fixed it to the structure in case I've got things completely wrong. I'm hoping to get a S-Kits air brake cylinder thing but if not I'll bodge one myself. To be honest everything is guess work and I don't pretend to know where everything goes. I'm sure some things are the wrong way round but I'm just trying to make an impression there are some air brakes going on It did take longer than i expected.... but this was mostly because I'm spent half the day staring at photos and guessing!! Next up some 51L cylinders and distributers... which have had their bases pretty much filed away and the cruel close up makes them look a bit rough but they seem ok. I can see a few pipes so I've added the one i know where it goes (distributor to cylinder).... but not sure where the second one ends up other than behind the cylinder! These have been made with 0.5mm wire bent to shape. I actually found having a beer helped me get through all of this! If you know where I'm going wrong or can help please get in touch!! cheers Will

Thanks James I hadn't noticed them.... but now you mention it I'll have to have a go! cheers Will

Hi Guy Not that I'm aware of.... although I've never spoken with Brian about 59s so you never know. I use 0.5mm lexan sheet and if you can find 0.5mm perspex... that'll be better. I think the thickness helps. Cheers Will

Totally agree... looking forward to your next update! Cheers Will

I do admire modellers who can batch build and maintain focus. My MK1 coach project is progressing but at a slightly slower rate than I'd hoped for, as currently I'm doing about 11 of them I realised I'd got a bit bogged down.... so to keep my mojo going I've had a bash at a 66 (as a quick and super easy project)! This one is a bit out of my time frame but I'm a sucker for an unloved loco going very cheap! And to cap it all an express models lighting kit was sourced from eBay for next to nothing so I went about fitting this first; In amongst the mass of wires is the express models kit which has been soldered up to 2 decoders (one with a 8 pin socket so i can program it separately. I'm rather impressed with this kit and defintely the best Express Models kit I've fitted. It also helps that Bachmanns original lighting arrangement is a pretty good starting place with excellent light feeds. So all thats needed is to rip out the circuit board (and capacitors) and solder everything up! Things didn't go quite so smoothly in that I was planning on using a DCC concepts decoder with a hattons 8 pin (as the function only decoder). Don't know why but both have failed and I'd vowed never to buy any again. The lenz standard and a chinese rip off are fine! It perhaps looks a bit complicated but was actually easy to install. Now I have 8 functions allowing separate night, day, tail and marker lights. I've left the markers and tail as directional for simplicity. Interior has been roughly painted with some light grey walls, dials picked out and blue seats. The light grey on the back of the drivers cockpit is very important as this seems to be very noticeable through the front window in photos I've seen. If you've read any of my posts before you'll probably know that i really dislike the manufacturers fitted glazing. I've tried to hide the thickness and refraction of the original glazing by painting the sides black. This involved painting both inside and out of the glazing and inside the body shell windows leaving only the window unpainted. The edge of the side windows was picked out with a silver marker pen and overall I'm fairly happy with the effect. Onto Kadees.... These are mounted directly onto the chassis so i fit a full sized skirt (is that the right word??). A holed has been drilled in to the chassis and I've used a 10 BA nut and bolt to fix the kadee. The nut and bolt is the opposite way round to how i normally fit them with the bolt underneath. This is so the bolt doesn't foul the lighting unit when it;s refitted and I only had to scrap a small amount of plastic off the lighting unit in order for everything to have a nice snug fit. There is a bit more plastic to remove from the loco front to get the correct Kadee height and I tried to only takeoff as much as needed so the front looked flush. Finally a spacer is needed (I used 4mm plastic rod with a 2mm hole drilled) to set the right height. Time to fit the skirt (?) - As this is one of my specials i didn't have the Bachmann originals. Thankfully I did have some Lima Class 66 (or 59) versions as spares. These are nice and thin and just about the right size (only a smidge under) - but need the Lima fixing chopping off and a new version made of 0.7mm wire adding. This has been superglued and is nice and strong (better than the originals, The setup does however allow me to change the Kadees now as they can slide out if needed. Air pipes are from a Hornby Class 60 as i didn't like Bachmann's attempts. Conversion to EM has been down using Branchlines 14mm wheels on 2mm axles and is very straightforward. As this is an older Bachmann 66 then I've also added extra pickups so it runs more smootly. Interestingly I've had to had a bit of plastic off to allow extra clearance on the front axles and allow them to turn freely. Before i did it I noticed alot of wear here so i wonder if the previous owner had the same issue in OO. It's probably while it was sold to me as a poor runner. Base weathering has started but there is much to do on tis. I also have to make up some steps (one missing) and one bogie is missing all of its extra bits... not sure how i can sort that out just yet! Maybe no-one will notice. So my quick project hasn't been particularly quick. But I've really enjoyed messing about with this loco over the last few weeks and it's got my modelling mojo back! Shortly back onto coaches although i may sneak a 60 in between! Happy Modelling!! Will

I recon you could fit this onto the same sized board.... Will

Cool - look forward to reading about it! Afraid I'm down sarf so only venture out to the London or Southern shows cheers Will

Your layout looks fantastic - do you have a thread as it'll be great to follow progress

I having a bit of a modelling lull too! Totally understand work getting in the way as it my challenge too. It'll pass I'm sure. Happy Modelling! Will