121 Gets A Roof

There's a theme developing of stalled modelling projects getting restarted around here.

While I've been tinkering with the tamper I'm building for a client and doing the last jobs on my trio of DZ wagons, Himself has finally got around to rolling a brass roof for our model of the 2nd 'Superbarn' 121.

As you will discover from previous posts on this blog on the subject of superbarns, I've decided to take a different approach with 121 than I did with my model of 103.

On the first carriage I managed to make the roof using my usual technique with styrene - described on the How We Build Our Carriages page here on the blog - but it was a bit of a hassle.

The challenge is the way the superbarn design has inset doors at the end but without the flat roof section above the way the modern WHR carriages do, which means there is nothing to support or give any 'spring' to the roof skin at this point.

Fitting a brass skin solves these issues.

Brass is not my favourite material to work with, mainly due to lack of practise I suspect. To use a good Scots word I quite often get into a fankle with it.

Himself, however, most definitely has the knack, and I'm very pleased with the way 121 has turned out and shall be sending 108 to him for the same treatment whenever I get around to building it.

By Way Of Demonstration

I've been busy making some hybrid wagons.

My friend at Narrow Planet, Steve, has very kindly offered to display my kits on his stand at the Beds & Bucks 009 Society open day this weekend.

As my range has expanded in recent weeks to include two types of B wagon and a choice of DZ wagon styles I've decided to make a couple of special demo wagons that show the options available.

So, as you can see below, I have made a B wagon where one side is standard SAR wagon with the usual centre door arrangement, but on the other side its been done up as a WHR bike wagon.

The DZ wagon (which is made with the latest riveted castings) sports both a full height SAR end and one of the cut down ends which the WHR wagons came with.

There will also be an example of the work-in-progress NGY ballast wagon kit on the Narrow Planet stand for visitors to have a look at too.

Pic Of The Week 3

This is a scene you are unlikely to see ever again on the FR.

I know I am not alone in mourning the removal of the passing loop - and more importantly - the signal box at Dduallt.

Yes, you can still see two trains there during gala events when one is locked in the dead end old Down platform, but you could not recreate this 'over and under' moment any more because Dduallt is now in the slap bang in the middle of the Tan y Bwlch to Tanygrisiau block section and so you can only have one train in section at a time.

What a shame it does not still have a signal box and a system with short and long section tokens like Rhiw Goch.

Improving The Breed

My DZ masters have gone all spotty.

Following successful experiments with the resin rivet transfers in the silicone moulds for the NGY and B wagon kits I am retro-fitting the masters for my first kit release, for the DZ wagons.

The 3rd generation of these kits will come with cast rivet heads and also the option of the more common, larger SAR ends. (The examples on the WHR were cut down level with the top of the side doors.)

The picture shows them with a box built around them ready for the RTV moulding rubber to be poured on.

Suffering For My Art

I am typing this post with mild burns on my finger tips following a session at the workbench fulfilling one of my New Year Resolutions: to get the KMX Tamper I am making for a client finished at some point in 2013.

To this end I have been fabricating the hydraulic pipe runs - which are a very prominent feature on one side of the machine - out of brass wire and strip soldered together, which is where the burning of the fingers occurs.

For the pipes I use picture hanging wire which I untwist into single stands. 

(I got a bit of a strange look from the assistant in the DIY shop in town when I went in to buy it. "How heavy is the picture?" she asked in all innocence, and appeared rather confused when I explained that I didn't actually want to hang any pictures with it.)

The strips of brass, representing the big clips holding the pipes in place on the real KMX, are snipped from leftover frets from my SAR bogie etches. Well, waste not - want not, and all that.

It's quite a fiddly process because you never get the strands of wire perfectly straight after they've been untwisted and so it takes quite a lot of coaxing to get them to lie next to each other and as a consequence I have to hold them qute close to the point where the solder has to be applied to make sure they don't wander off on their own accord during the process - hence the slightly singed digits.

You may wonder why I don't use brand new wire of a suitably small gauge, but I find the picture wire is better for getting the unruly look of the pipe runs on the real thing than starting off with perfectly straight, brand new wire.

B Prepared

While my wait continues for the etches for Bettendorf bogies to appear I have found myself scratching around for useful things I can be doing.

I'm reluctant to launch into a big new project only to find I have to drop it halfway through if the bogies turn up out of the blue.

So I've been busying myself casting the parts for the first tranche of B wagon orders.

These are the parts for one pair:

Unfortunately I dont' have the option of doing the same and trying to get ahead of the game with the NGY ballast wagons - much as I would like to - because it won't be just the bogies which are being etched but also the cogs and brackets of the ballast door mechanism and I can't be 100% sure that I will not have to re-design any of the cast parts after I have had to the chance to try out the brass bits on my prototype wagon.

Pic Of The Week 2

A really delightful scene for the second of our shots by Chris Nevard, as Earl of Merioneth drifts down the spiral.

Doesn't she look fantastic with the red rods and the white rims on the wheels? Classic 1980's FR - except she's got a very Noughties set of carriages in tow.

This is not a view of the sprial you would ever get in reality, unless you brought along an off-road cherry picker, because the ground falls away to the east of the embankment.

It's one of my favourite pictures from the shoot and I think it shows off what a fantastic job Himself did on the scratch built body of 'The Square'.  He really captured the essence of this beast.

The Earl is surely up there with the Gresley A4's and Stainer's streamlined Duchesses in being 'of it's time'.