Round And Round

There's been some gentle progression on the commission to scratch build a model of FR buffet car 114 in styrene this week.

Before I can start adding a second layer of detail on the sides I needed to fill the gaps at the corners of the window frames.

My favourite material for these jobs is Milliput.

It doesn't dry too quickly and crumble like the sort of model fillers you squeeze out of tubes, and if you wet the surface it will flow into the tiniest gap and leave a brilliantly smooth finish, as well as setting very hard.

I've also made the base pieces for the two ends of the carriage.

For these I've used a different technique to get rounded corners, this time gluing tiny triangles of styrene strip into the corners and using a file to shape them.

DFS - Damned Fiddly Seats!

Sometimes you just have to bite the bullet.

I've been chewing over how I would make the first class seats for 150 for quite a few weeks - not in any kind of constructional detail, just thinking about how curvy and awkward they are.

You see what I mean? Not your average seat, is it.

Having said that (or indeed, written it) it's reasonable to aspire to make up something that looks vaguely like it in 4mm.

It is not, however, reasonable to make sixteen of them. Not for me, anyway.

So I shall reach for the resin and I have begun work on a master I can make a mould from.

The trick here, given that I don't do split-mould casting (yet) is to break the seat down into bits that can be cast in an open-back mould.

One of the issues is that these high back seats have a pronounced bend in the lumber area.  (The old Pullman seats do as well, of course, but it's hidden by the wings to a large extend so you can get away without representing it)

To do this in a way which is mould-able I have filled the gap with my old friend Millput.

I have also had to leave off the front legs.

I may add them on later, or a may not, given that no one will ever realistically see them and the seats should support themselves quite adequately because they are either placed back to back or up against a partition.

The same goes for the armrests.

I will most likely add them on to the castings with strips of styrene, but to put them on the master would increase the probability of miscasts greatly.

I don't need that much frustration in my life, I have quite enough already, thank you.

Disco Domes

One of the design features which I think has always made the FR 'tin cars' easy on the eye is that they have very few hard edges.

Look closely at one of the carriages and you'll see it is softly rounded, from the windows to the thick pillars at each end and, of course, there's the trademark domes at the end of the roofs.

I've always thought they had a look of the BR MkII about them. Perhaps it was even a design influence?

To me it is recreating these soft edges which is the key to a convincing model of a tin car which I've noticed is sometimes overlooked on other models I've seen in both etched brass and 3D print.

So, as promised, a little detail on how we go about doing our domed ends.

In previous posts I've shown pictures of the roof skin with the triangles cut out of each end.

What I do next is to fit a smaller triangle, on a slant, inside the gap.

The only purpose to this is to reduce the amount of filler required and to give it a firmer base.

Once again my filler of choice is Milliput which is ideal for the job because it is firm enough that you can force it into the space and mould it with a moistened fingertip without it all spurting out at the other side, or going off so fast that you only have a few minutes working time, as is the case with some cellulose based products.

It's clay-like properties when it is freshly mixed allows you to over-fill your space and then slice the extra away with a sharp blade.

Because it reacts so wonderfully to water you can make your top surface really slopping knowing that a few minutes later it will have reverted to its previous clay-like state.

This also means you can get the top surface really smooth. If you nick it or drag across it then simply wet you finger and smooth it all over again.

I'm going to leave this now for a day or so by which time it will have set as hard as concrete and I can finish it off with wet and dry paper.

Wonderful Stuff

I've been using one of my favourite modelling materials to fill in the gaps in the corners of the windows on 121.

Milliput - the two part epoxy putty produced by a family firm in Gwynedd - is ideal because it is firm enough that you can push it into small spaces without it squirting out the other side as some of the stuff you get from a tube would.

At the same time you can add a droplet of water to it and make it run into tiny gaps and afterwards wipe away any excess.

Whilst it does take 24 hours to set the benefit is it remains workable for a long time so it doesn't develop a fragile skin within a few minutes of contact with air, and it also dries to a perfectly smooth finish which can be sanded, drilled or filed.

Later on it the project it will be my material of choice for forming the domed ends on the roof.

Sometimes I wonder how I would ever manage without having some of it in my modelling box.

Look out

A reader of the Bron Hebog Facebook page asked me how I was going to make the master for the guard's look out duckets on 11 & 12 so I thought I should show you some step by step pictures.

Instead of trying to carve the curvy shape out of a solid block I prefer to build it up with a framework with a thin styrene skin over the top.

In the first picture below you can see I'm making it up on a thick section of styrene because it's going to be used as a casting master.

I'm using 0.60" seize styrene and I've laid out the formers for the flat, square upper section of the ducket.

The bars on the outer edges of the top section are inset because this is going to form the tiny window opening - you'll see the effect when the skin is placed on top.

I've quartered a piece of styrene tube and glued that along the top - with a slight lip - to represent the tumble home at the top and the very bottom bar has been shaved a little with the blade of the scalpel to round off its edge.

Next I glue on a 'skin' to the exact same width as the framework.

It's quite thin. I've chosen 0.10" sheet. You'll see why in a moment.

You can also see how the window opening is there now.

In this last shot which shows the completed ducket you can see that I have pressed the tail of the skin down and glued it to the backing piece to form the distinctive curvy profile and chopped it off at the bottom.

I have also added some thin beading strip and filled the gaps with Milliput.

Now it's ready to have a box built around it and be covered in gooey moulding rubber mix.