Darwinian

Thanks for the suggestion Johnster. I think these are actually grain of wheat filament type. I will live with it for now, higher priorities.

Couldn’t find anything. He doesn’t do many coach buffers. Might be a wagon buffer that would suit but I’ve not spotted one.

Finally got a bit more progress to show on the C19 (2nd downgraded to all 3rd). These aren't the easiest of kits and the instructions are minimal. There are no instructions for making the train alarm gear at the non step end but luckily there are some photos in Russel and on Penrhos site. So here is my attempt. The central box is a short length of 1mm square tube. The "Ears" some 1.5mm square bras rod filed to the correct (?) profile and then sliced off with a piercing saw. A slot cut in the back using the piercing saw and opened up to fit over 0.45 mm wire with fine wet and dry paper. Lamp irons are from the kit etches although the waist ones were all the same handed so I had to adapt a couple that were etched without a fold line at the base. A step at this end is from a scrap of 1mm x 2mm brass angle. Vac pipe from 0.7mm brass wire and a scrap of etch waste for the fixing bracket. I've not fully decided how to couple this to the next coach in the set but it will have an appearance of connected pipes. The brake rigging is just intended to look OK. There is no fixing hole for the cylinder casting so I had to guestimate its position and tweak it once all the pull rods etc. were tried. The pull rods were soldered to their cranks with a high melt point solder (plumbers) and then then everything soldered to the operating rod with 145 C solder. I put the "ears" that connect to the cylinder the wrong way up the first time and had to disassemble and repeat. The white metal gas tank (on the far side) came with a large fixing lug in the centre that looked awful and didn't line up with anything solid to fix it to. I filed it off and put a scrap of brass strip about 5mm wide across the top of the V hanger plate and then soldered the gas tank supports to that. There should be a turnbuckle in the middle of the truss rod but I forgot it and I,m not going to take them off again now! I'm also stuck for buffers. The kit comes with some nice turned buffers but the heads are too large and the bases are round instead of rectangular. Dart/MJT do the right type but they are out of stock. I might just use their wagon version instead.

This is what it looks like with the layout lighting on. I think the "oil lamps" are really still too bright (and too tall for most situations) but are better looking than any othrer ready made alternatives I could find.

The lanterns are the gaugemaster “oil lamps” turned down as far as I could get them.

Goods shed now done. Here's an illumination shot of the forecourt area to show the different light levels achieved by using a single LED in the goods office and one in a light tube in the main part of the shed. Also the variation in lighting from the station building lighting tube.

Johnster, regarding dim lighting the Roye England/ Pensdon light tube technique works well for this. Make a 1cm x1cm square tube of white (on the inside at least) card leaving gaps on the face where you want the light to come from. The bigger the opening the more light but the less at openings further along. Mount a single LED in the middle of the tube. I’ve shown the one fitted to my goods shed on my Cwmhir thread.

Johnster- regarding the light bleed problem. I assume the shed isn’t fixed down as you talk about painting the inside. Simply line the inside shell with thin white card. It will be easier to paint too. Not my idea, used by Faller in house kits I have from my yoof.

OK I'll own up that the W4 Peckett wouldn't actually run through my 00 FS pointwork without taking the wrong road at times especially on the double slip. So today I took off the rods and took the wheelsets out. With the back of a wheel supported on a handy pair of small pliers jaws I placed a scriber in the middle dimple of the axle end and tapped gently. This was repeated for each wheel until I had drifted the back to back out to 14.8mm. It only needed about 0.5mm in total so great care was taken and on one axle I had to gently close up again a little. Following reassembly and getting rid of excess grease (especially some that had become smeared over the pickup wipers) and it now runs smoothly through everything. I have also made and painted the downpipes for the goods shed and station building. Pictures to follow once they are fitted. Here's the next bit of my photo sequence. The Peckett returns from the colliery with another short raft of loaded wagons.The crew must have nipped into the station for a call of nature. I should perhaps explain that the theory behind the Cwmhir layout is that there is a steep incline, only the foot of which is modelled, up to the pit limiting loaded wagons to short 4-5 wagon trips down. Similarly loaded trips up have to be propelled by the loco to minimise the risk of runaways. These short rafts are combined in the sidings and picked up by a main line loco (usually a 0-6-2T) to go down valley to the collecting sidings and onwards to the docks. I have cheated a bit here as the Marchowell wagon has 3 link couplings whereas the Peckett has Dinghams. The Dingham loop did stay on the wagon hook down the incline but normally I plan to have Dingham's at the end of each raft of wagons.

Sure is. Scratchbuilt in plasticard in case you were wondering.

Our photographer has moved to the station platform. Having dropped off the full wagons in the exchange sidings the Peckett picks up empty Powell Duffryn wagons to take back to the colliery.

A bit of train running this afternoon. Well posing more than running as the Peckett still has its BtoB as it left the factory so it doesn't always follow the road set on my finescale pointwork. Also having some issues with current supply to fiddle yard cassettes and transitions therefrom. Anyway it was a bit of fun. Here comes a Peckett down the incline from the colliery with loaded coal wagons.

Now the diversion from the instructions. The end pieces for the clerestory are just the right height now they have been removed from the ends. If built as intended by slotting them through the lower roof they would have been too short. They were too wide however and had to be filed back about 0.5mm each side to fit between the clerestory sides. These sides are exactly the same length as the main sides so fitting the clerestory ends between them matches the body length. I blanked off the clerestory lights with some strip brass I had in stock. Looking at other stock I have built I think the recessing of the windows is too little, especially given the lack of raised bolections. So I am thickening the sides with a plasticard liner. A strip the depth of the side top to the bottom of the waist panels was cut. Held against the inside and marked around each window opening. These will be glued to the carriage body and very carefully trimmed back to the brass openings. I drilled each corner and then joined the holes try to insure I stayed inside the marked openings. This has the added advantages of packing out the curve of the lower side and giving a better anchor for door furniture, which will be glued on after painting and lining.

Modified bogie stepboards today. One variation on these is a single board the length of one axle box spring, mounted over the outer end axlebox. The etched stepboards look too thin so I split them in half and soldered the two halves together. A back upright section was added from scrap etch waste. Here are the various stages with a completed board on the left. I have since added the mounting brackets from more etch waste.

Interesting contrasts in the panelling modifications too. Top has no raised beading below the windows but still has blanked out clerestory lights. Bottom one still has most waist panels but fully flush clerestory just with the ventilators. None have full length stepboards on the bogies.

Harold Gasson in one of his books recounts breaking the whistle chain between loco and trailer which swung down hitting the coach/cab. Could the whistle connection be made at the smokebox end or did the driver have to rely on the autocoach bell alone when being propelled? In general as mentioned above the loco could be turned to suit the working but if a replacement autocoach was needed maybe it was not always possible to turn it immediately.

More progress on the C19. All according to the instructions. Except that I am making the clerestory a separate unit and part of the roof structure.

According to the product information the gold plating makes them easy to solder things to them? Dunno why that’s useful.

Putting in the final pin when the track is completed?

Hope you are back to modelling, RMWebbing fitness soon Rob.

Knocked up the bogie frames today. Straightforward fold ups but .... I reamed out the holes for the bearings and fitted Gibson pinpoint bearings. Folding up the first one showed that the Gibson axles were about 1mm too long resulting in splayed out sideframes. I had some H&A models bearings in my stock of bits so tried those ... close. Made sure I'd removed all trace of the burr raised by using the tapered broach around the holes ,,, perfect. Run very freely and at speed through the Cwmhir trackwork. Only problem now is that I have another Blacksmith clerestory to build and I only had 9 (how does that happen) bearings left. Will have to order some more for that one.

Back to the C19 Clerestory while I sort out some suitable rod to make downpipes for the goods shed. I find painting droplight window frames a pain so I'm going to glue the droplights in after painting the sides. SO First up forming the tumblehome in my "GW models" rollers (never really happy with my hand rolled attempts). There is a piece of cereal box card against the detailed side of the etch to protect it from scratches and to help prevent the panels deformingning between the raised mouldings. The instructions say to first clamp the main sides to bend over the top and bottom fold-unders but I couldn't see how I could form the tumblehome if I did that. I ignored the instructions and clamped the long fold-unders into the vice jaws (extended with aluminium angles, and then used another piece of aluminium angle to bend back the main side, making sure I pressed against the bottom moulding so that it went around. Then the ends need to be modified. I cut off the ends for the clerestory using repeated passes with a knife blade until it starts to part and then snap off. Great care needed here, if it' not cut through enough it will try to snap along the raised moulding edge instead (No prizes for guessing how I know). The end spacer part is designed to fold up against the back but it needs filing back a bit. I didn't take enough off the first one and had to snap it off and solder it on as a separate piece. Important to leave clearance for the buffer beam tabs to come through. At this point I attached the solebars. I think these should have a bottom flange but they don't. Probably not visible below the footboard from most angles but I'll add one if it should be there. One end was attached per side using my trusty "jig" ensuring it was on square and then the corner pushed tight against the backstop of the jig and soldered up. The tabs for the solebar pieces were ground off so that there will be a pretty flat base for the plasticard floor all the way across the body. The two side/end combinations were then tack soldered and checked for squareness before soldering up the last corners.

Err, they’ve put the grab/commode handles on wrong. You wouldn’t be able to reach them when alighting. Very in-GWR.

Never been a big TV watcher. The “GWR stone” colours are just the Precision paints ones.

A slightly belated happy 2021 to all. I have been working on the goods shed. Interior of the shed is papered with Scalescenes “whitewashed stone “ held in place by acrylic Matt varnish. The varnish has caused a slight green staining in the corners especially, and a reddening in other areas. I’ve had this problem using PVA and inkjet prints before but had hoped the artists varnish wouldn’t do the same. I have also made a lighting tube to provide a dim light in the shed that hopefully looks like paraffin lamp light. White mounting Card tube 1cm square with two light openings and central warm white LED