Blacked Out

The title is not a reference to current affairs - some attempt a click bait - merely a reference that the cursed carriage Gwyrfai has fooled us again!

Himself was fitting the handrails at the door end when it suddenly occurred to him he has yet to black out the end windows in the cubby hole behind the saloon.

This will be done by painting a section of the glazing.

Fortunately he’s noticed now rather than when he had declared it ‘finished’.

Speaking for myself I’m glad it’s not just me who’s been caught out.

This fourth Pullman observation car has been a swine at times - please, no more!

Gwyrfai Glazed

One of the (many) tricky jobs on scratch building these Pullman observations cars has been completed.

Himself has cut and fitted the glazing to Gwyrfai and put the carriage back together for a photo call before it is dismantled again for varnishing.

 What do you reckon?

Halfway House

Himself is reaching the end of the arduous job of lining out a Pullman observation car.

I’ve seen quite a few models of Gwyrfai crop up on my social media - including brass body kits and 3D prints - but I wonder how many will be finished off to this exacting standard?

The transfers have been quite a challenge this time.

Our favoured Fox products appear to have been updated, so whereas before some were a little too big, but just about fitted, now they definitely don’t.

So we’ve had to mix and match and with the help of an FR friend have obtain a sheet of the secret 3mm scale decals exclusively produced for members of the 3mm society.

These are what we’ve ended up using for the crests and also the name.

This was a bit of a saga.

The Fox sheets of old used to give you blank borders and alphabet sheets to make up the name of your choice - nowadays you can only buy sheets with a selection of ready-made names.

Himself tried more than once to slice these up to create a blank box and individual letters but - unusually for Fox products - the transfers broke up as he tried to apply them.

Perhaps just a bad batch?

So he’s ended up using the 3mm versions, which turned out to be a tiny bit bigger!

As the kids say - whatever!!

It’s going to look fabulous, isn’t it!

In The Nick Of Time

We’ve just had our worst case yet of ‘Boston Lodge Syndrome’, which is what happens when a modeller gets caught out by the craftsmen in Wales not following the script.

Himself has been progressing well with the painstaking job of lining out the new WHR observation car Gwyrfai when he sent me an alarming late night message saying “Er, shouldn’t there be a window above the door at the back?”

A quick google search confirmed the worst.

Bugger!

But how did that happen??

I dug out the drawings and it became apparent it had happened again....

Between us we quickly concluded that the only possible remedy was to drill holes in the styrene panel and file to shape.

It was a high risk strategy that could ruin the whole model of it went wrong.

Fortunately, Himself has pulled it off (at least on one side) with only minor damage to some lining which can be repaired.

What puzzles me most is that no one involved in building the real carriage - who I know read this blog - warned me.

First Class Job

It’s the turn of Gwyrfai for the paint shop, starting with the interior.

Something to note is the way Himself has tried to replicate the panelling on the ceiling and the lush carpeting and exposed framing of the armchairs.

The exterior has also had initial coats of plum, and cream on the doors, and soon it will be time for the painstaking task of applying the Pullman lining transfers.

Optimism

I’ve done my bit on Gwyrfai and it’s been delivered to Himself disguised amid bags of shopping from the supermarket.

The reference to optimism is regarding the number of chairs in the front saloon.

I’ve fitted 8 as per the design, however the carriage entered service with only 6.

Will it ever receive the missing pair as originally intended?

Will this be the carriage equivalent of the New Moelwyn Tunnel portals?

Am I going to look a right idiot?

Only time will tell......

Finishing Line In Sight

Finally I can see the end of the Gwyrfai project - it at least my bit of it.

Last night I finished the outstanding jobs on the interior, fitting the bulkheads, lowered the tables in the front saloon and fashioned something to represent the shelf at the front that actually hides a demister unit on the real carriage.

The remaining construction tasks now are to fit some steps, the electrical connections at the corridor end and fit some channels under the ceiling to help hold the glazing in.

After that I will deliver it to Himself - without breaching social distancing (!) - and he can have the dubious pleasure of painting and lining it.

Won’t that be fun!

* I should probably point out that I am a key worker & Himself lives on my route to work.

They’re In

So last night I decided to stop faffing about and get the interior fixed into Gwyrfai

The tricky bit is always making sure the seat backs are lined up with the window pillars precisely, but the slow setting super glue helps with this.

I have still to make up the bulkheads and I also need to cut down the height of the small tables in the front saloon where the windows come down lower.

It feels like a big step forward has been taken, though.

The Importance Of Model Railways

In times like these when there is so much uncertainty, so much than can leave us fearful, I am reminded what a wonderful hobby model railways is.

It occurred to me as I was stubbornly attempting to force flat styrene sheet into a complex curved valance at the front of Gwyrfai that I’d completely forgotten about the Coronavirus and everything that goes with it.

It doesn’t have to be model trains, of course, because any practical hobby which requires you to focus on a task is brilliant therapy at an anxious time in all our lives.

With it looking like so much of our day to day lives are about to enter a prolonged slumber here in the UK (and elsewhere) it might be that I have more time to spend at my workbench, and if I do I shall be glad of it.

You’ll see from the photo that I’ve also applied and shaped the Milliput dome and I think it’s looking quite good, although a coat of primer will soon expose any flaws.

I think the next big job will be to fit the interior which is already cast.

In the meantime everyone...

Over The Top

The roof has been the focus of work on Gwyrfai this week.

In the photo you can see the structure I use with the flat false ceiling, longitudinal ribs and the styrene skin over the top and glued only at each edge.

I’ve also made some shapers to help form the sloped end at the front.

The voids will be filled with Milliput, which although it takes longer to set provides a much smoother and more solid structure than filler ever could.

Plastic Surgery

The camera can be unforgiving sometimes - this is not as rough as it looks when seen with the Mark One eyeball.

I’ve faced the brass former at the front of Gwyrfai with styrene and added the second layer of panelling detail.

The next job will be one of the most testing ones - to fit the roof skin and form the sloping front section.

Take The Floor

I had one of my most productive days in a while at the weekend getting to grips with the returned Gwyrfai.

The first task was to replace the temporary floor with one that fits all the way to the curved front, which will help to make it more rigid during handling.

I also knocked up the skirts along the side which hide all the brake gear and other ancillaries underneath.

Once that was done I prepared the false ceiling which will be used to secure the top of the body sides and will have the roof skin formers added next.

It is also the base for the domed end which will be shaped in Milliput.

Brass Front

It was a delicate operation but Himself has done a brilliant job fabricating and fixing on the brass front piece of Gwyrfai.

Now it’s my job to laminate it with a thin styrene surface and make a proper chassis to replace the temporary one it has just now.

I think it’s definitely captured the look of the real one, don’t you?

The challenge for us both will be to complete it in time for the Perth show at the end of June.

Back On The Straight And Narrow

For the moment the flirtation with standard gauge is over and Himself has scaled up to resume work on Gwyrfai

The plan was always for me to make 3/4 of the body shell out of styrene and for him to fabricate the curved front in brass.

This is it having a test fitting, and it looks pretty good to me!

Repeat Business

I was intending to do a little work on the interior of Van 51 this weekend, but then a customer got in touch asking if I would sell him some castings for the seats for FR observation carriage 150?

(And at the end of January one never turns down the offer of extra income....)

When I made a set for Gwyrfai it took me the best part of a week but I got these done in a morning.

(It’s amazing what a financial incentive does, eh?)

It also helps that I prepared a second set of rubber moulds in advance so this was proper mass production, of sorts.

Plastic Meets Metal

With three quarters of the body pieces for Gwyrfai made I can begin to glue them together to start assembling a carriage.

The hardest bit is still to come, which is making the curved front of the obs end.

On Glaslyn I did this all in styrene, and on the FR carriages I made a master for bottom piece and then cast it in resin.

This time I’m going to try a brass former with a styrene skin.

The plan is for Himself to solder in the window pillars and add on a cant rail at the top, but obviously that has to be done before I can add and styrene, and before it can be attached to the rest of the body.

In the meantime I’ve made a floor piece and a temporary clamp to try and keep the rest of the body in shape as much as I can - it’s very flimsy and delicate at the front just now.

The Thin End Of The Ob

I’m on a roll with Gwyrfai with two sessions in a week!

The second layer of detail has been added on the end piece including the corridor connections which are made up from strips and shaped to look like folded rubber.

The big test now is to make the curved front end piece.

At Last The End

The festive season has been a bit of a washout for modelling, but on the last day of the year I found half an hour to have a go at making the basic outline of the corridor end of Gwyrfai

It’s a fabricated piece and the first job is to assemble the pieces I will need, including the solid lower piece and the top piece shaped to the roof profile.

A really good tip is to use a sheet of glass as your surface and use a metal ruler as a guide to make sure your joints are square and straight.

Also make sure you place only the tiniest drop of solvent on the joint - capillary action will do the rest for you.

As well as the ruler I like to use a couple of very precisely measured off cuts as guides to make sure the windows either side a precisely the same width.

Finally, chop the pillars to the exact height you require and glue the top piece in place.

Triplets

We can’t manage a line up of four Pullman observation cars like the FR did recently at Harbour Station, but watch this space....

Himself decided a little photo call was in order after the final assembly of 152, posed in the fiddle yard with 150 (not named Gwynedd in Bron Hebog-land, and Glaslyn.

The design change to 152 with the two pillars at the front was on account of customer feedback from 150 with its single post in the middle.

It’s a convenient way of quickly telling which is which but I still can’t decide which I prefer.

Sandwiched

It's been weeks since I did any work on Gwyrfai but I managed to get a couple of hours in yesterday thanks to the need to use up annual leave before the end of the year.

For such a comparatively small part of the body shell the doors on the WHR carriages take a surprisingly long time to make.

My technique with making carriages out of styrene is to build everything up in layers.

I start with the middle of the sandwich, which in the case of this carriage is a simple oblong piece with a hole where the window in the door goes.

Rather than cutting a hole I create it, adding vertical styrene strips to a square piece, measuring and cutting them to length, and then placing a another piece along the top.

The edge where it joins the carriage is extended by 1mm to give an overlap with the main body side.

Then more strips of styrene, of various lengths and thicknesses, are added in position on top to give the depth which creates the doorway.

On these WHR carriages there is also quite a thick piece glued on its side to create the distinctive inset - this is the bit where it will connect with the back of the body side.

Finally, a third layer is added on the back which creates the window droplight and also the kick plate beneath the door.

The important thing is to keep checking at all stages that they are of identical dimensions, and to ensure they are a mirror image of each other.