Van debter

This week I have been mostly building some wagons and a nice little brake van. The van was a kit I ordered from evilbay on a bit of a whim; I've mentioned my brake van addiction before and this helps feed my problem. I didn't realise that it was a Tom Bell design although it looked familiar. It turns out to be part of a new range of kits designed by him and printed by a partner.

When it arrived it came with no instructions in a little bag, neither thing a problem. The parts needed a little cleaning up on their edges with a needle file but otherwise all was well. 

It fitted together nicely, the only part not printed was the roof which was a piece of styrene sheet which needed cutting to size and banding to shape, not too onerous. On reflection I should have painted and glazed it before attaching the roof. In the end I used Glue n Glaze to do the plain end and left the balcony ones unglazed as you can't really see them.

I added a few details such as vac pipes and a chimney for the stove and the job was done, I really like the proportions of it and it suits the smaller rolling stock very well.

At the same time as building the van I decided to complete the rake of 009 Society kits I bought at ExpoNG and to add a little variety I added a tarpaulin support to one.

With a squirt of primer

and then painted

The first wagon has the tarpaulin fitted over the support. A sheet of printer paper folded and stuck with superglue and then painted to look like mucky tarpaulin.

The Germans are coming...

Having been busy in the so called, real world recently I haven't had a lot of time to progress the dozens of things I'd like to get on with on the layout. The biggest and probably most obvious one of these is the sorting out of a backscene for the new bit. I have a tame printer who will be able to print it for me but I still need to find an image, basically just sky.

 

 

One weekend was occupied with a trip down South to Swanley to visit ExpoNG with the F&WHR marketing stand. It was a cracking good show with many inspirational layouts. As ever at events such as these it is also good to meet up with lots of people that you only meet in real life at shows. Much nattering was done and the wallet got a little bit frightened when it was required to purchase a couple of the lovely Technomodelle coaches. The nicest of which is this articulated pair; I also bought a single 4 wheeler.

 

I spent a happy evening adding a little paint detail and weathering to the new stock and also finally glazed the third of the TR coaches. Each one is painted slightly differently as each time I thought I remembered what I'd done before and was too lazy to check. Each one and the van have come out nicely but it's just as well that I'm not OCD about carriage liveries matching.

The articulated pair looks rather good with the Minitrains Decauville

But then again the Brigadelok is probably more suitable

It seems to be a time for black locos as the Barclyfied Krauss also seems rather at home

Another black loco paid a brief visit this week too; it's the lined black version of Lyd from Heljan. I have to say it is a very fetching finish and completely suited my maroon PECO L&B coaches. However, I had to give this one back so someone can make a purchase from the shop.

 

One non-modelling but related project that I've been working on is the extended history of the Isle of Stoner. It now contains details of island life all the way back to the stone age. I still have a little more work to do on it but I will eventually add it this blog. The map has had a few subtle tweeks too and this is now displayed at the head of the blog.

Bits and bobs

It's been a while since I posted an update and that is mostly because I haven't done very much modelling recently, life gets in the way sometimes. Anyway, here are a few bits and pieces that I have done.

 

Olwen has been lined out, my most ambitious scheme yet and I'm pretty happy with how it has come out. Just waiting for plates now.

This is it with twin, Nettie who got a bit of a service and a few updates, mainly to the roof.

It was time to finish off and build a few new wagons, and another TR coach

The wagons are finished but the coach is still awaiting glazing and a final assemble

I finally got round to weathering all of the ROCO U and V skips, so now I have a fair train of them

Wagons need loads so I got out my box of Busch vegetable kits and spent an evening sticking small plants together and quite often to myself. Very fiddly but the end results are very convincing, if a bit large especially as they are supposed to be HO.

This wagon got a load of PECO milk churns

I've been gradually finishing off Rock Beach, most of the buildings are now fixed and lit internally as I wanted.

 

The daytime view reveals that I've been making gardens and adding some more plant detail. I don't have pictures of some of the new greenery but the differences are quite subtle in some areas and don't stand out but add to the overall look

 

Off to EXPONG next week but only with the work marketing stand, then at the end of November it's the mixed blessing that is Warley. Again, only with work but it gives a chance to top up on supplies.

I want to ride my bicycle

Having hurt my back again this week I've had some enforced staying at home time and so have cracked on with some modelling by way of occupational therapy. Firstly I added lining to Nancy, my Varikit bash, it also got some tidying up of the paintwork here and there.

 

Having just sold off some freight stock I added one of the new Bachmann ambulance vans in SR insulated guise to the fleet; a splosh of weathering has taken off the plastic look.

In the process of building the new version Skylark, the old one, Nettie, has been tarted up and has had the chassis attended to. She had developed a bit of a limp which someone suggested was a quartering issue. After close examination this was found to be the case and with some fiddling about and swearing applied it now runs as sweetly as the brand new one.

While looking for something else on evilbay I stumbled upon some laser cut whistle signs so these have sprung up at appropriate locations.

A few years ago I had a visit from Werner Knopf of WEKbahn fame and he gave me a gift of a tiny little, cast brass and etched copper kit for a pedal powered inspection car. At the time I looked at the kit and decided that I couldn't build it; however some years have passed and I've been practicing and everytime I've seen the kit languishing it has given me a little pang of guilt.

It was very fiddly to build but here it is. Only problem is that is 12mm gauge, I looked at it with a view to narrowing it and decided that I couldn't do it without destroying the whole thing.

I've also converted another DM35 into a brake van as I've been running a bit short on vans...

Here is the quadcycle in painted form. The only bit I didn't get entirely right was the pedals but close enough. It will sit beside the line somewhere and be admired.

Olwen has had a couple more details added, namely smokebox door handles, some coal in the bunker and some nice turned brass window surrounds. These were intended for Skarloey but are a perfect fit here.

A tale of three locos

I haven't posted anything in the last couple weeks as I've mainly been occupied with other things, however I've had a spurt of modelling mojo this week which has resulted in Lucy B finally gaining her name and works plates. They really add the splash of colour which contrasts with the green and the shiny dome.

 

 

The one thing I wasn't happy with were the couplings so I ordered a set of my favourite RT models PQR brass ones and exchanged them. Result? Happy John.

 

As usual I am more than usually broke so I decided that I should make a steam loco from kit parts and  chassis that I had to hand and the sell it. I had a good rummage in my big box of bits and found most of a Varikit. A while ago I went through a phase of buying a whitemetal kit each month and just emptying all the parts into said box. This means that there are all sorts of things in there; actually I found quite a lot of several kits but that will be another story or two.

 

I also had a Minitrix chassis to hand that looked as though it would fit, not the classic docktank but a more modern German job with proper valve gear. I have another loco on a similar chassis which runs very nicely so I thought this one should be ok. I think I bought it off evilbay on a whim as it was cheap.

 

Anyway, long story short, it all went together quite well and after changing the motor and fiddling about with the chassis I got it to run pretty well. The resulting loco is now for sale on evilbay along with some kit built wagons which my recent spurt of kit building have made redundant,

I also finished painting half a dozen ROCO skips which I've had for years so that I now have a fair train of them: I like how they stream along behind the Baldwin.

 

Building the Varikit got me in the mood to build another loco, but to keep this time. I had another rummage in the filing cabinet of shame and came up with a Chivers RC39 and a Minitrains F&C chassis which I had intended to join together. I already have an identical loco, Nettie which is an IoSR stalwart so a sister loco seems like a good plan. 

 

The years intervening the construction of the two locos have not been kind to the quality of the castings and I spent a lot of time filing and bodging to get the parts to sit together properly. The chassis needed a small amount of modifying as did the footplate, once they fitted nicely together and all the parts were cleaned up I glued the basic loco together.

 

I will make a styrene roof as the loco is slightly tail heavy, as with Nettie I'm not going to bother to even fake the pony truck as it doesn't notice. I will add some more weight in the side tanks and maybe add a styrene boiler tube full of liquid gravity. I'm looking forward to adding details and painting this one. I think the same dark green lined livery as Lucy B. will suit it well.