D1047

Hi Andy This is 100% D1037 Western Empress I have found an exact match on your flicker site. cheers Greg

Hi Andy As Flood as said ,the small rectangle that houses the battery switch is at the 'B' end of the loco and on one side only, also the same side is the oval boiler port.Overhead flash positions , various types of windscreen wipers headboard clips if fitted and finally the paint scars then help to possibly identifying the loco.The circular window is the emergency fire bottle release and is on both sides of the loco and is slightly more off set from one side . Keep the pics coming they are superb. cheers Greg

Hi Andy 3rd one not D1005 as it had lost its headboard clips that end. cheers Greg

Hi Andy 100% D1037 Western Empress for the bottom pic cheers Greg

Hi Andy bottom pic is D1058 matches a few pics I have . cheers Greg

Hi Andy The bottom pic is D1070 matching its battle scars Great pics keep em coming cheers Greg

Hi Phil Thanks for the comment .They were regular visitors on the Padds as you know and I have many a fond memory waiting in anticipation for the arrival and if the right driver was on we would cab and ride whilst shunting the stock away.Great days and I feel an invasion on the way for Shenston road.Thruster finished next may be Rapid in maroon full yellow ends, or Vigalant late blue.

Here is my effort of 841 Roebuck.I have EM re-gauged the wheels that Paul kindly reduced the thickness of the flanges for me, replaced logo with correct size added loco crew nameplate from shawplan and weathered to pics I have found taken late 1970. A 'Superb' model from bachman. cheers Greg

After further research I have found a David Mant pic of D862 in Maroon and a dieselimagegallery of it stored with MU before it was reinstated on 27/4 70.The Book of warships states D857 D862 and D864 were refitted with MU between 67 to 69 .This book is excellent research material and well worth nearly 30 quid.

Hi Phil Now that I have my glasses on, the date shown to blue for D845 is 20/02/70 , the MU equipment removal must have been the mid to late 60s as all the 43 pics I have studied have lost them by then apart from 857 which carried them till the end. cheers Greg.

Hi Phil there is a shot of 845 in The book of the Warships at Gloucester dated 18th March 1970 looking ex works if thats any help cheers Greg

Hi Phil I agree early 60s looks like red route restrction . I have just finished 841 Roebuck and nearly completed 853 Thruster next in line 861 Vigilant ready for a blast around Shenston road regards Greg

Hi Andy Defo D1000 at Lawrence Hill, I have a shot of it at Swindon 73 fits the pic including paint chip marks on nose and has modified lamp bracket. Great pic cheers Greg

Hi Douglas I have EM gauged using existing wheels by simply opening out the original wheels.The flanges are some of the finest Bachman have used .Paul James kindly took a slither off the backs of the wheels on his lathe but I don't think this is absolutely necessary if you don't have access to a lathe it just helps to retain as much of the split axle to be retained in the gear sleeve.All the brake gear is correctly set to scale so no need to adjust and the gear wheel holds the axle in place so no need for washes .Tested it on my Shenston road and runs a treat. Well done Bachman for making it EM friendly. cheers Greg

Hi Steve I have a minimum radius curve of 3ft on the inner circuit and have no problems with link or screw couplings but if possible try to build a transition into the curve. cheers Greg

I saw "Falcon" at Hereford about 1974. It was the single line pilot loco while engineering work was taking place between Hereford and Tram Inn.

Hi Bob Thanks for the comments.I have used the Heljan model for my pre tops and early tops models as I think they capture the prototype with a little work better than any other offering. I can live with them being 2mm to wide . I weathered 47091 as seen in 1974 when it worked a Hereford to Margate mystex that I travelled on at £1.75 a ticket bargain, and unknown to me at the time my future wife was also on the train enjoying a trip to the south coast,I headed back to Ramsgate to bunk the depot so it was a must to model. I picked out the bare metal to replicate the patch up nose end with aluminium colour before applying washes of thinned down greys and browns and then blended in with an airbrush.I start at the bogies with frame dirt then a light coating of brake dust and then work up the body with roof dirt . I also spend time around the battery box and boiler water tank area with dark greys and thinned down inks to replicate the oil and fuel spillage class 47s seem to suffer from,and then finish off with matt black to represent the soot around the exhaust.Good pics to copy are essential. I have not studied the bachman 47 so cant really comment on that one but I use a fine tipped rotring 0.3 pen to blacken the inside edge of loco windows .This gives a nice straight edge easy to do with the glazing left in place and gives a nice flush glaze effect.Also good for head code boxes no class 37 40 52s etc. Hope this is of some help and good luck with your 1677 project cheers Greg

Hi Guys. Thanks for the comments and also a big thank you to Kier for his excellent camera skills.The distressed track in the steel works has been fashioned wide to gauge so as not to affect running. I wanted to achieve the run down look I have observed in many industrial locations without compromising running so by attacking the plain line this I have achieved,although Kier's pics make it look more severe than it is probably due to the telephoto affect.I will spend a bit more time in adding weeds and grot to give it that run heavily worked and run down look. I have also replaced eight six foot tubes with four five foot L.E.D. 40w tubes in the railway room and been very pleased with improvement on the lighting, a very sound investment and noticeable in the clearer pics now been taken. cheers Greg

Just to add to Paul's comments. The Leathers tanks later taken over by Hayes and built by C.F.P.M. to dia TE004A in 1970 and totalling just 8 wagons used to run through Hereford in the early 70s from Avonmouth to St Helens.I built these about 20 years ago having obtained a good detailed works drawing. They were built for a future layout to be based on my train spotting memories. I started by reduced the drawings to 4mm. They were constructed again using a fax tube as the tank barrel and airfix tank end caps, evergreen strip and channel was used for the chassis MTK esc1 bogies were sourced from my odds and sods collection and John Talbot supplied the buffers discharge pipe and hand-brake wheel.I made a jig for the walkway hand rail and Paul kindly using his soldering skills fabricated them and soldered them to a etched brass ladders.The livery was colour matched to a photo and the lettering was done in the same way as the Murgatroyd tanks. thanks for looking Greg

Hi Mark Most of the large industrial buildings have been kit bashed from Walther or Kibri buildings or building parts with a few extra bits added or extended.The plans are usually discarded and the building purpose built to fit the footprint.The brewry for example was a Kibri colliery .There is also a few scratch built buildings copied from photos of suitable buildings from the black country to try to give the area an identity cheers Greg.

Hi Brian Thanks for your comments.The chlorine tanks are scratch built, I was planning to use the Triang tank as a basis but gave up due to the many inaccuracies I would have to put right.Roger Silsbury kindly sent me a lot of info on the various types 16 years ago and along with photos John Talbot kindly lent me and the aid of my diagram books I was able to create a more accurate model.John also cast the plate bogies and the filler cap and tank saddles, the rest was built using ever green and the barrel is plastic fax tube that was cut to length , the ends coming from airfix 35 glw tank barrels.I done the lettering by using the edding and/or DECAdry dry print onto plain waterslider transfer sheet then applied the completed transfer to the tank barrel. this enables you to get the right spacing and keep it level (much easier to work out the size and spacing on a flat surface before applying to the barrel) . This train use to pass through Hereford in the early evening on weekdays from Sandbatch to Baglan bay and due to the nature of the product carried, always ran with a brake van on the rear . The train had unfortunately stopped running when I started on the railway in the mid seventies so its operation beyond Hereford to me still remains a mystery.As you noted, I have found pics of the odd tank on the east Usk branch and also a pic of a rake of empties returning in a mixed freight climbing stormy but have never seen them pass through Hereford returning north. cheers Greg

High Wayne I weathered the BAA / BBAs using my airbrush and a good pic of the chosen subject.The flooring usually has various white markings to aid loading so I painted them first . To replicate the heat damage I cut out small round stencils and over-sprayed Railmatch light rust after the wagon had had a general brake dust dusting .To finish off I used thin plastic strip painted a rust colour to represent bent loading stanchions and glued them in place to hold the coils and are left in place when running empty as per prototype practice.Paul has taken a couple of pics and will post them shortly. Hope this helps cheers Greg .

High Guys Thanks for the good comments, I must thank Paul for the time and effort he has put in to take the pics and post on RMWEB, my camera and skills are not quite up to it unfortunately. The layout has a continuous run underneath to ten through sidings so makes it to complicated to exhibit so with this in mind it was built into a purpose built room. It is still work in progress so as long as I don't get distracted with the latest must have, it may be finished one day!!.Paul has built a couple of superb signals which is the next project to make working, some pics will appear shortly to show his handy work . It is good to charge up my inspiration by browsing through this website and gazing over some fantastic skills that can be seen on here BCB being just one of many favourites.It is also good to get positive critique as that can then be used to improve on bits that are lacking, D1007 as example, I spent many a long hour studying photos to get the weathering and battle scars right only to miss the pale grey window surrounds as seen in the pic,fortunately an eagle eyed RMwebber spotted this seen earlier in this thread I have since put right my omission. cheers Greg

Th e apples were landed in Barry docks then railed to Hereford.The first year Hereford drivers used class 14s to trip and shunt, later they were tripped from the yard to Bulmers with the resident 08, shunting over the apple hoppers was then performed by Cider Queen exD2578.The wagons used were coke and 21t HTO HTV coal hoppers.I remember in 1974 during the oil embargo watching the Worcester society Kitson Caernarvon used for the apple shunting that season.From the mid to late 70s loose apples finished being transported by rail instead apple pectin a sort of semi dried shredded apple was transported to Bulmers directly from France in French owned ferry vans. cheers Greg

Thanks for the kind comments guys.RMWEB has helped inspire me to try and complete Shenston road and up my standard with the knowledge and fantastic modelling that's shared on here. I must thank Paul James, a life long friend who has helped me develop this layout over the passed 14 years and also Kier Hardy who after moving to the area about 8 years ago becoming firm friends helped kick start a stalled project with some fantastic buildings and help with the dark art of the electrics. A lot of work is still required to complete my vision of a chunk of my childhood pre tops 70s, in the industrial midlands but there is enough to now loose myself in time and recharge the creative batteries . It can also be operated to a later date with careful selection of the stock I have built up to revive my memories of working on the railway from the mid 70s to the grey era , present day hasn't quite got the magic for me. Its getting there as long as I don't get distracted with new must have's. .I hope to show further progression through Paul's expert camera lens , as my box brownie don't cut the mustard!!. Thanks for looking. Greg