2019 - Part 4

We rounded off the year with a first showing of Bron Hebog in Scotland at our own club's show in Greenock and with the debut of our new set of WWHR carriages.

Unfortunately only Russell is able to pull the whole lot up the hill. Gelert and the Baldwin have to have the load reduced....

130 is really starting to come together, although once again Himself is waiting for the real one to be finished so we can be completely sure about all those little details.

I'd finally got round to making a start on the second WHR Pullman observation car which is being given the name Gwyrfai.

November

Progress on the carriage has not been rapid but did get most of a day to myself to start adding the beading to the side pieces.

Himself decided that after many years broken on a shelf it was time to get our original Blanche back into running order, a major operation which required the strip down of the chassis and replacement of a gear wheel.

He was also getting on with the very intricate task of lining out the FR Observation car 152, the completion of which has taken most of 2019.

December

To bring the review up to date, as you've been reading in recent weeks I've been making an effort to complete the first model of van 51, which has sat for many months looking like this.

And Himself celebrated the completion of 152 with a line up of our three Pullman obs, hopefull to be joined by a fourth next year.

Thanks for reading our updates during 2019 and we look forward to sharing more of our modelling with you in 2020.

2019 - Part 3

The summer saw us taking Dduallt for its third showing in nine months, after receiving an invitation to represent the Greenock club at the show in Perth.

This was is up there among one of the best in the country and we're very much looking forward to returning with Bron Hebog in 2020.

June also saw an unexpected opportunity to purchase another Backwoods double fairlie, which Himself duly snapped up and straight away began starting work on a James Spooner, being careful not to get ahead of the real one under construction at Boston Lodge.

The Gladstone Car was also finished with transfers and the illusion of curtains in the central saloon now in place.

August

We didn't waste any time starting on the next of our WHHR carriages.

Himself soldered up a Worsley Works kit for the buffet car and I was given the job of knocking up an interior in styrene.

James Spooner now had its bogies and firebox (motorbox) complete.

Hot on the heels of the Buffet Car was another brass body shell for the Ashbury corridor carriage in its original form, which we're doing up as the replica built for the WHHR.

September

There was a little more scenic work done on Bron Hebog ready for its next outing in Greenock in the autumn, with more trees being planted.

By now the WHHR carriages were already being painted.

And Gelert was in the final stages of painting and lining with a lot of extra details being added to the 3D body to really set it off.

2019 - Part 2

The next instalment of our review begins in April when I was making the interior for another 'bowsider' which was destined to become number 20 in Col. Stephens green.

Himself was being challenged with building up a prototype chassis for Gelert which we had been asked to test, seen here beneath the Robex 3D printed body.

Some finishing details were being added to observation carriage 152.

May

Dduallt was back on show just down the road from us in Troon.

I was puzzling out how to fit an interior into the Gladstone carriage while still allowing for the floor to be removed for painting and maintenance.

Carriage 20 was swiftly painted and made its debut on the layout at the show.

June

I was embarking on a project to create a kit of parts to build the P Way van 51 in its current condition - shown here are the first of the castings for the body.

The chassis on Gelert was progressing with the motion now in place.

And carriage 152 was taken for a first test run on Dduallt.

Fortunately, this time I'd drilled the holes for the bogie pivot bolts in the correct position and it didn't foul the rockface in the cutting beneath Rhoslyn Bridge!

2019 - Part 1

Every December I like to take a look back at all that we've achieved between us in the last year. (Mostly Himself, if we're being honest...)

In January of this year our 4th NGG16, 143, was on the test track still in brass.

There were more carriages on the workbench, with brass roofs being made for the second of the superbarn Observation Cars and another of the saloons.

Himself had also started assembling a Worsley Works bowsider 17, to give us a model in the current colours.

February

A few weeks later and the superbarn saloon was almost ready for varnishing.

We'd also begun putting together a Worsley Works NWNGR Gladstone Carriage as the first stage in a WHHR rake.

By this stage the Garratt was well through the painting process.

March

By the begining of the next month it was finished and taking a test run with sister 138

17 had also been varnished and is pictured on Ddaullt.

And we ended the first quarter of the year with Himself starting on the 5th Garratt, destined to be 130.

Welsh Highland Heritage

With two weeks to go until Bron Hebog goes on show for the only time in 2019 at the exhibition in Greenock, here's an image to whet the appetite.

The two WHHR Ashbury corridor carriages are finished and ready for service, having been given a coat of varnish and reassembled.

What you see here is the rake used for Russell's historic trips to Beddgelert earlier this year, although ours seems to have ventured further north...

During the exhibition we'll also be using Gelert and the Baldwin on this set which will make a very colourful addition to the layout - especially the Rheidol brake van which we've depicted in the BR blue livery it carried for a short while.

The real one has since been repainted into a rather drab chocolate colour. (correction: maroon)

To which all I can say is: spoilsports!

It’s Curtains

The Gladstone Carriage is finally, finally, finished.

The last job was to paint the curtains on the posh compartment in the middle which has worked out quite effectively.

You might also notice there’s been another change inside since the last update I posted.

That’s right. I won the argument about the colour of the fabric on the bench seat which has been repainted pink.

To my eyes that’s the dominant colour of the rather exotic moquette.

But for genetic reasons Himself and I don’t see eye to eye on colours always.

The Borismobile

Those who know their Westminster history may appreciate the irony in almost completing our latest Worsley Works carriage as BoJo becomes the UK's political leader.

The man reputed to have ridden in this carriage would probably have a lot to say to the latest tenant in Number 10 Downing Street.

William Gladstone was a Prime Minister who also knew what it is to split your Governing party on the defining political issue of his generation, and which also involved the very delicate question of the future of the island of Ireland.

Rather than relaxing by making models of buses from old boxes (or so we are led to believe the PM does) Mr Gladstone liked to use his spare time chopping down trees and seeking out so-called 'fallen women', to guide them back onto the path to righteousness.

Enough political references, however.

What you really want to know is that Himself has completed the lettering on the NWNGR carriage.

We decided not to bother trying to replicated the intricate, shaded letters, and have used just gold waterslide transfers from the Fox range, and I think they look effective enough.

All that remains is to source a suitable shade of pinky/purple paint to create the curtain effect on the glazing in the centre compartment.

Gladstone Gloss

A new item of stock which didn't manage to make it to the show at Perth was the Gladstone carriage which is still in the process of being painted and finished.

Not that it matters anyway, because the real thing would never appear at Dduallt anyway, but as the years go by we've started to bend the rules and run things - like a WHHR set - just for the fun of it.

The carriage has had a couple of coats of Humbrol gloss paint, which is applied - very carefully - by hand. There is no masking tape used to get he join between the red and the ivory, it's just a question of concentration and a steady hand.

The colour of the seats in the centre compartment has been a matter of disagreement. To my mind the fabric on the real carriage has a distinctly pink shade about it, but I was overruled, with the deciding vote coming from someone who's authority is not to be questioned.

So blue it is.

We've also gone through a lengthy process of deciding what to do about the N.W.N.G.R lettering on the side.

On the real carriage these are gold letters with partial red shading, but we've been unable to find anything equivalent to that.

We could, of course, go down the route of commissioning a bespoke set, but we've tried out some plain gold letters as a test and concluded that the red shadows probably wouldn't show up very clearly against the colour on the carriage anyway.

Prime Minister’s Carriage

Himself has begun the process of painting our latest carriage, a reminder of the days when our most senior politician was probably regarded with a great deal more reverence than the men scrapping for the keys to Downing Street this week - although I suspect there was no less intrigue.

There was a request for a blow-by-blow account of how we paint our models so I’ll start with an image of them being primed.

We do this to give the top coat a better surface to key into.

We spray them using bog standard primer aerosols you can buy in a car parts store.

The red is for the brass parts and the grey for the plastic (or in this case, resin) bits.

Parliamentary Majority

Nearly all the construction work on the Gladstone Carriage is done now.

Himself has made up some air brakes pipes for each end, and fitted a basic underframe - all things which are DIY on these body-only kits.

He also noticed the etched holes for the door handles and handrails were in the wrong place at one end of the carriage (it's supposed to be a mirror image) and he's fitted the footsteps and beefed them up with some brass wire behind to try to protect them from being knocked off by accident.

Now we're just waiting on a new pair of bogies arriving.

Dare I suggest that it may make an appearance in traffic at Perth in a couple of weeks?

Roof On

There's been a lot of work done on the Gladstone Carriage since I finished the seats and passed it over to Himself.

The most obvious change is that a roof has been made and fitted.

Roofs are what you might term an 'optional extra' with Worsley Works scratch-aid kits, and Himself always likes to make them from brass, which is no doubt the best solution.

He tells me this one was a bit of a struggle to fit, probably on account of the very flimsy top rail of the carriage body compared to most other vehicles.

The seats are all now fixed to the removable floor, and the glazing is in place in the central compartment, although it will be slipped out when the carriage is painted.

At the moment it's sitting on temporary bogies from our pile of redundant Dundas ones from the FR corridor stock bogie replacement programme.

Seating Solution

We came up with a way of fixing the bench seats into the Gladstone Carriage - but it required liberal use of the disc cutter!

The problem was caused by the large box structures which hold the captive nuts to hold the chassis in.

They are part of the body because they soldered to the compartment dividers, and where what was stopping us attaching the interior seats to the floor / chassis.

The solution we came to is to removed the material at each side so that all which remains attached to the body is the central section with the nut inside.

This clears the way for the longitudinal benches to slip in from beneath, and retain the glazing too.

So now Himself can form a brass roof and get that soldered into position, which will protect the very flimsy and vulnerable top rails of the carriage.

Frontbencher

The last of the seats for the Gladstone Carriage have been finished and now I’m beginning to wonder why I agonised so much before starting on them.

The last ones were the long benches at either end of the open saloons.

Now it’s time to let Himself solve the conundrum of how to fit the seats in the centre compartment - and the glazing - while having no access from above or below if we follow our usual routine of fixing the roof in place before the carriage is painted.....

Parklife

I’ve been adding slats to the seat frames for the Gladstone Carriage I cast a few days ago.

These are the eight single seats which are arranged facing the end of the carriage in the two unglazed saloons.

Still to made are the long benches which are placed in front of the end windows.

I know the slats on the seats are much thicker than on the actual carriage, and there should be a lot more of them, but I’m not a ‘rivet counter’ and I think these will be effective enough.

Feeling Inspired

The exhibition at the weekend gave my motivation the kick up the backside it needed, and I resolved to sort out the seats for the Gladstone carriage which I had consigned to the ‘too difficult’ box in my mind.

One of our fellow operators suggested that the 3D printing might be an option, and I gave it active consideration for a while, but eventually decided that the price of getting them produced would be more than I would be prepared to pay.

(And generally I’m not prepared to pay when it can be avoided...)

So I returned to my original plan which was to cast a resin frame and add the slats in styrene.

I bit the bullet and made a master, which I shall now make a mould from.