Domestic Duties

Himself has been putting the finishing touches to a little side project to make a track cleaning wagon, which will be handy for the hard-to-reach areas in the centre of Bron Hebog.

This was made up from a Nine Lines L and B bogie van we ended up with - I can't remember how - and finished in the current FR infrastructure livery to try and make it blend in a little.

I'm not fond of this colour scheme, I think it looks dreadfully dull, and I might have thought you would wish vehicles that are likely to be in the vicinity of personnel working on the track to stick out like a sore thumb, but what do I know?

It makes a nice little model, and if we ever get back to exhibitions then it will probably make a few circuits during the course of the day to try and keep everything running smoothly.

It's packed with so much lead weight that it needs to be topped and tailed with two locomotives.

Another One Joins The Fleet

 I'll keep this post short and let the picture do the talking.

As you can see, Lyn is now lined, varnished and reassembled, and ready for action on Bron Hebog, whenever model railway exhibitions are allowed again.

I've written before that Lynton and Barnstaple locos are not my favourites, neither is the unsubtle Southern livery, but Lyn is the most appealing of the lot.

I think it's perhaps got the Earl of Merioneth attitude - it doesn't pretend to be pretty, it's just built to do the job.

And if you don't like that, tough!

Southern Comfort

 

Before leaving for a week in Wales, Himself was making startling progress on the lining on Lyn.

It was a stroke of good fortune that one of the sets of 4mm scale standard gauge Southern locomotive lettering produced by Fox fits exactly for the tanks.

The same was not true of the numbers for the tenders which were a little on the large size, but we found a set of numbers in yellow in the general alphabet and numeral section of the catalogue which are a lot more suitable. 

The white lining is very impressive, particularly around the nameplate on the cabside and even more so on the oval plate on the bunker.

I'm never really been a fan of the Southern livery on any size of locomotive - it's a bit too 'in your face' for my tastes, and I've never felt Lyd fits in on the FR like that.

I much preferred it in the spoof BR black, or its original pre-grouping livery would be even better in my mind.

Somehow the loco which suits it best is this big, boxy American interloper.

Lining Lyn

Himself is making steady progress painting our Backwoods Baldwin Lyn.

He's reached the lining stage of the process.

Although its the white which stands out most in the picture there is also some black lining there, forming the neat edges to the green.

This was applied first and has been varnished to provide a better key for the narrow white lines.

They're a lot simpler to apply that on many of the FR locos because they have 90 degree joins instead of inverted corners which can be a real pain in the backside.

Green Agreement

It's a rare day when Himself and I are as one on the question of colours - especially greens!

But we had a rare outbreak of unity in choosing the paint shade for our Backwoods Lynton and Barnstable Lyn which is now being finished off.

Himself bought a selection of Southern shades from the Railmatch range and what we decided on was a 50/50 mix of Light Olive and Malachite Green which best seemed to marry up with the photos we took at Dinas a couple of years ago.

Himself held off with painting this loco because he was never quite satisfied with how it performed - it always had a very pronounced waddle.

The solution has been to disable the compensation on the front driving axle, locking it in place with a new bearing. 

Years ago we had to do the same on the Backwoods Ladies which we could never get to run right as the designer intended.

Review Of The Year - Part 3

July

And so to the second half of 2018 where there was much excitement at the arrival of our first ready-to-run model, the Bachmann 590 Baldwin.

I've never made any secret of my enthusiasm for the mainstream manufacturers discovering 009.

The intensity of the debate online around this has been second only to Brexit, but unlike the latter subject I can see only positives in this development for our scale.

I'm hugely excited about the next project in the pipeline, the small quarry Hunslets (especially the cab-less versions) and for what this innovative firm might decide to do next.

In this month I began work on a project which had been on the back burner for a while, to make models of the hybrid BZ wagons made at Boston Lodge for infrastructure trains on the FR.

I decided to make masters and cast them in resin, even though only two have been produced so far and they are far from identical.

July was also the month where, quite by chance, I discovered that the last two Backwoods NGG16 kits produced were available to buy.

We had to dig deep to avert the possibility of them being offered for sale in an online auction, but we'd been looking for a number of years for the opportunity to complete our Garratt fleet and it was too good an opportunity to miss.

August

The first of the BZ wagons had been cast and was being put together.

The fold-flat end doors are a right pain because I had to scratch build the triangular support brackets in styrene, which was a very fiddly job.

Himself had been putting together a Chivers kit of a tiny Hunslet diesel to replace our model of Harold, the Boston Lodge shunter, which had been stolen when we were exhibiting Dduallt in Leeds a number of years ago.

And to have a bit of fun for when we took Bron Hebog to show at the Welsh Highland 'Super Power' weekend I decided to add a very contemporary scenic feature - a reminder of the day when a driver tried his luck racing a Garratt to Bron Hebog crossing - and the Garratt won!

September

Himself had taken an executive decision to invest in panoramic photographic backscenes for the show at Dinas.

The result was very effective indeed!

We had a fabulous time - as we always do - showing Bron Hebog in the goods shed, this time in its finished state.

The Lynton and Barnstaple Baldwin Lyn was the star attraction on the railway and Himself pulled out the stops to get the Backwoods kit we had been given running.

Once again we couldn't resist being cheeky and double-heading it with Lyd knowing that the real locomotives were not being allowed anywhere near each other that weekend.

Back home the production line of superbarns continued with a start being made on assembling number 120.

Rebel Without A Tender

Even though we've worked for 20 years to create a layout of very ambitious scale, one which is also as accurate as we can make it, we're not above having a little fun with what we run on Bron Hebog at exhibitions.

We've always quite enjoyed making a cheeky reference to the politics of the railway or happenings, such as the model of the crashed car at Bron Hebog crossing which - as I expected - was a talking point at weekend among those 'in the know' who came to look at the layout.

Another irresistible target was the appearance of the replica Lynton and Barnstaple Baldwin Lyn at the Superpower event, which was appearing on the Welsh Highland for the weekend under the strict understanding that it would never been seen near the FR's resident Manning Wardle Lyd.

(That moment is to happen for the first time in Devon.)

With Himself having burned some midnight oil to get our new Backwoods Lyn to the stage where it can run the temptation was too great...

The model itself is still requires a lot of running in, producing a rather dramatic squeal if given too much juice, and it still has a rather pronounced waddle at this stage, but it managed to put in a few laps of the layout, some of which were caught on camera.



The real loco was only running top and tail with Taliesin between Caernarfon and Waunfawr, and we had the chance to take a ride behind it courtesy of the free Rover tickets which the railway provided for all exhibitors.

Ours ventured a little further south to Beddgelert.

We will, of course, post updates as construction is completed.

The Third Baldwin

I mentioned in passing on here a few weeks ago that we have a new locomotive project - a Backwoods kit for the Lynton and Barnstaple Baldwin Lyn.

The real sized replica will be running on the Welsh Highland next weekend so I guess that provided some inspiration for Himself to dig it out of the box and see what it was all about.

This model is unusual for us because it comes part-assembled.

It came into our possession as a quid pro quo from a good friend of the layout in return for Himself taking on some advanced troubleshooting on a couple of other locomotives.

Now, with second-hand Backwoods kits the best advice is caveat emptor and it's very much the case here.

(Apologies, this post keeps drifting off into Latin.)

Himself tells me that the person who'd started the kit had broken the golden rule of following the instructions to the letter.

In this case they'd jumped ahead a few stages in putting the frames together meaning it was now impossible to insert the wheels, and their associated compensation mechanism.

Fortunately it was not so far advanced as to prevent him unsoldering parts and reconstructing it as it was designed to be put together.

Himself tells me he regards all this as a very good warm up exercise for taking on one of the new Garratt kits we obtained in the summer, which I anticipate will become his main winter project.

Are You Ready To Run?

I got my first chance at the weekend to take a look at Heljan's 009 ready-to-run Lynton and Barnstaple Manning Wardle tank loco, and mighty impressive it looks too.

This really does mark a watershed for the scale.

For the first time a manufacturer is giving us a model of equivalent standard to that which standard gauge modellers have been able to take for granted.

I hope that they, Heljan, will have massively underestimated the demand for models like this, are both rewarded for their gamble and encouraged to look for follow ups.

This model was being held captive inside a display case in Glasgow so we were unable to take a close look at it.

Himself's first impression was that he still thought the Backwoods Miniatures kit - which we used to make our Lyd - is a better model.

But then he would say that, because he can build them!

For the likes of mechanical imbeciles me like this loco looks like a glimpse into the promised land.

Do not take from what I have written that we are kit and scratch building snobs who turn our noses up at ready-to-run, for we long ago put down a reservation for the long-awaited Bachmann Baldwin WD 4-6-0's.

There is nothing wrong with top quality RTR in my eyes, nor with the best of the 3D printed bodies that are being designed by enterprising people like Narrow Planet and Robex.

I will admit, though,  to being more than a little frustrated at some of the utter abominations that I do see being knocked out on printers by modellers who it would appear are content to have something that bears only the most passing resemblance to the prototype.

It looks suspiciously like in many of these cases the truth is that all that matters is that the model is designed and produced at the fastest possible speed.

Many of the people behind these seem to be young, and impatience goes with the territory. Perhaps they will be in less of a busting rush as they mature.

What really irks me, however, is that in this age of cyber commerce many of these 'models' are put out there to buy through 3D printing websites.

Which brings us back to ready-to-run 009 which must be carefully nurtured in its infancy.

I believe strongly that we should not baulk at the prices the manufacturers charge for models such as this Manning Wardle, nor judge it against the cost to some of these 3D print offerings.

That would be to compare oranges and rotten apples.

The other thought I have is whether we, as a scale, will be able to exploit the potential for bespoke ready-to-run in the same way as the 00 fraternity has?

Look in any of the model magazines and you will see adverts from some of the most well known model shops and specialist firms for exclusive, short-runs of unusual prototypes.

Others, I note, are embracing crowd funding.

Can this not be done in 009? And who might be brave enough to do it?

One of the delights of Narrow Gauge is that there are so many one-off locomotives, and I suppose it could be difficult to find a market for hundreds of models of one single engine.

But there are other examples of small classes that can be exploited just as Heljan and Bachmann are doing.

For example, what about the Rhiedol tanks? Yes, there are only three of them but look how many livery variations have they worn between them over the years.

The current VoR owners seem very enterprising and go-ahead people.  Might they not like to explore the idea of commissioning a run of models to sell exclusively?

You've got a retail and marketing proposition rolled into one there.

Then there's my own first love, the FR. And how many opportunities there are here!

Can anyone seriously argue that a top-notch RTR 009 England engine wouldn't sell?

What about the Penrhyn Ladies?

If Heljan can provide for interchangeable cabs on their L&B locos then surely it's not impossible, with a common chassis and basic body dimensions to mass produce some lovely models of Linda, Blanche and Charles.

I suspect the lead-time on a model would be too long, and Boston Lodge would beat them too it, but what a marketing wheeze it might have been for the FR to commission a 009 model of their new Double Fairlie James Spooner?

The chassis is always the stumbling block in 009. Once you've got that look at how many other Double Fairlie variants you could plonk on top.  (So long a the rivet counters would overlook the variations in wheelbase and other minor details.)

Can I be the only one thinking along these lines?  I'd love to read your thoughts.