Railway modelling in 7mm scale on 9mm gauge track, representing 15" gauge miniature railways and 18" gauge industrial railways.
(Plus anything else that I choose to include!)
I've said it before an I'll say it again, when I start tinkering with wagons something is either amiss or afoot...
Seeking a suitable wagon for an extended diorama I'm working on (more on that another time), my initial thoughts were to use my Black Dog Mining mine tub, at that point sat on a KB Scale skip frame. In context that looked a bit wrong so I switched it back onto it's original chassis, however it still didn't look quite right - being too much of a view block.
Recalling a picture I had seen recently of a skip frame flat wagon where the planks were longitudinal to the frame I opted to make a flat wagon on the KB Scale skip frame. I initially scribed some 60 thou styrene to make a planked top but I found this looked far too neat and instead added basswood planks over the Black Dog adaptor. The planks were finished in a weathered wood effect and representations of nail marks made using a pin.
I had loaded the tub with a couple of Black Dog leaning sacks and a pallet, rather random but it worked in the context of the diorama. The flat has a Black Dog laying sack, all of these parts being from the painted selection I had to hand having been used in other places in the past.
I do rather like the mine tub with the block couplers and it is causing a few thoughts about how to treat wagons if I ever get that un-stalled layout project back into motion...
When I built my 'Humberston' diorama I always intended to go back and a little more, including a bench on the platform and a couple of suitable posed figures to bring a little more life into the scene. Looking at photos of the real LCLR revealed that the benches were most likely ex-LNER ones with a mixture of two and three support variations, seen to advantage in this picture of South Sea Lane and in the background of this North Sea Lane picture.
Looking at available 4mm scale benches I couldn't see anything that quite matched, at least something that wasn't going to either leave a lot of spare benches and be easily obtained. The Cooper Craft GWR bench kit looked like it had potential if de-Westernised, but getting hold of one is a tricky business due to supply issues. Luckily a plea on the NGRM Online forum turned up a pair of spare ends and from these I could build a reasonable representation of an LNER bench.
The seat itself is 30 thou styrene scribed into two planks and rounded on the edges, the back pieces are 30x40 and 30x80 strip. Underneath lengths of 30x40 strip sit under the join in the planking. The Cooper Craft ends have lost their GWR scrollwork to become a passable representation of the LNER supports
The bench was red oxide primed and then several attempts were made to get the colour right, a light maroon but not too, well, maroon... With some dry brushing of a lighter shade on the edges it looks about right. It has been joined by some new figures for 'Humberston'. Ironically none of them want to sit on the bench!
The figures are an assortment of Dapol ones, chosen to be a little "timeless" in style and to have the look of figures riding a seaside railway rather than being 1960s commuters. Modifications are few, the lady with the umbrella has had her hat removed and blended into her hair, and the little boy has lost his long socks and had his cap rounded to look less schoolboy-like. Positioned on the diorama they tell a little tale, the boy seems keen to watch the Simplex depart whilst his mum and sister look on waiting (no doubt in despair). The railwayman waits for departure time...
I will try and get some pictures of the complete diorama in due course. I have also been working on a few changes to another diorama, but that will have to wait for another day!
I have been tinkering with a project that is outside my usual comfort zone and quite honestly, for a time it threatened to remain so... I've been following the progress of Mark Clark's "Locos'n'stuff" range for some time and keeping an eye out for anything that may be suitable for use in O9. The new 'Larger diesel bogie' offered some hope as 9mm gauge was included in the specification. So I ordered one, with the possibility in mind of making a less chunky chassis for the A1 Models Keef than he Bachmann 'brick'.
First impressions were good, the etch neat and the parts well packaged, but my first read of the instructions was not too hopeful, as there was no explanation of how to fit the layshaft, gears and wheels etc. Thinking I had a missing page I contacted Mark, who gave me the missing details but admitted he often missed areas familiar to him out...
The build of the etched parts went OK, the frames were shortened to be the same length as the Bachmann chassis and the wheelbase set at 22mm. It has to be said that building to 9mm gauge gives very little clearance to get the soldering iron in! I then moved on to getting the layshaft in place, tricky but achievable with perseverance. Then came the bit I was dreading, the wheels... I had purchased a new desktop vice to assist (well, I say purchased, persuaded a relative to buy it for my birthday!) and having got the gear fixed in centrally I pressed the first set of wheels into place, and it is important to say I was looking from above the frame... To my horror disaster awaited underneath...
With the wheels pressed fully on the axles (as recommended), the frames were bent inwards. I contacted Mark and he advised to remove them, straighten the frames and then file the bearing faces flat to the chassis side. This time the wheels went on OK and after some adjustments I was able to give it a test run, having fitted the motor and drive belt into place. With pickups fitted I was able to run it properly.
Test running started to show up a downside of the wheel profile which is aimed at wider gauges, with a thick, rounded flange. There was a very narrow sweet spot between getting the flanges between the rails and the back-to-back through Peco 009 pointwork. This was further exasperated when trying the chassis on the 6 and 5 inch curves of the 'Getting Something Moving' project, where the flanges were bumping up over the rail head in places. There was not enough flexibility in the setup for curves this sharp.
On a whim I removed the wheelsets again and replaced them with a set of the much finer Greenwich 8mm wheels as the central axle size is the same. With a few tweaks to the pickups these have bedded in well and on test on the sharp curves rides much better.
Whether I'll repeat this excursion into chassis building I'm not sure, I haven't yet decided if the Keef will actually receive this chassis or if it will be put aside for my Narrow Planet/James Hilton Perrygrove 'Jubilee' kit, as I don't really want to put that on a Kato chassis with overlength wheelbase.
The thought did occur to me that in 14mm or 16.5mm gauge form this chassis could be used under the A1 Models Keef to give an O14 or O-16.5 loco... Hmm...
After planning a scenic treatment for the Julian Andrews brickworks plan that didn't incorporate a running line hidden in a building, I decided to try a version that was closer to the original in that respect. This plan also moved the trees towards the background and potentially does away with the backscene on the left hand side of the board.
The building as sketched is a close copy of the one completed Misterton Fen Tramway structure, the workshop. I sold this on, due to storage space constraints, so it would be good to recreate it in some way.
Mocking this up in finest cereal packet card created a better effect than I had anticipated, The grouping on either side of the trees/smaller huts and the tree/tank/workshop seems to work well. The idea is that this layout will be my first use of a photographic backscene so there won't be quite such an apparent gap in the scene. The Port Wynnstay hut features again whilst the adjacent engine shed could equally be a concrete sectional structure rather like the old Skegness miniature railway example that I built extra wide and in low relief a few years ago.
There may be a few more ideas to consider, but I might have to eat some more cornflakes!
Drawing inspiration from the old 'Misterton Fen Tramway' sketches and the more recent pizza exercises I have now sketched a few ideas for my project based on the plan of Julian Andrews brickworks layout. These initial ideas have dropped the line running through a building approach of the original.
The first sketch uses a round tank on stilts very much like the one in the old sketches. The arrangement on he left hand side incorporates a workshop containing some machine tools that I have in my possession. The building would be based architecturally on the one part of the MFT that got completed - the workshop. I sold this on, due to space constraints, so it would be good to recreate it in some way.
I came up with an alternative for the right hand side that used the Port Wynnstay hut and a modified Airfix/Dapol tank (on brick piers). However, my mind must be in 009 mode still, when I attempted a 3D mock-up it wouldn't quite fit as sketched and I had to adapt the idea a little.
This was certainly a starting point, I had a few concerns about being able to see both lines curving away and how that might look, especially as I envisaged backscene boards both sides of the scene. Also the two trees I had in mind to use in the scene have turned out to be better background trees than foreground examples.
There used to be a pizzeria locally who's trademark was square pizza. I suppose it is better box space utilisation if nothing else...
Curious I took the estate scene pizza and translated it to the same 13 x 19" board size as my 009 scene 'Old Quarry Line', retaining the 5" radius curves of the pizza but adding in a straight on each side allowing a short siding to be incorporated.
Having checked with a full size plan the siding would probably have to be curved in reality, but it just about fits. Overall the scheme reminds me of some of the micro layouts that James Hilton has built over the years, more recently in OO6.5.
At 13 x 19" is isn't much smaller than the 15 x 24" of my stalled corkboard scheme but it seems a very different style of scene. All this thinking is leading towards how this project could be restarted and as part of that process I have revisited some older sketches made during the development of the 'Misterton Fen Tramway' scheme (another square pizza) to see how I tackled issues such as the line vanishing behind the buildings and through the hole(s) in the sky.
In the scheme above a tank on brick piers, and a simple block structure hide the exits. The tank was the focus of my attention, I think it was envisaged as Knightwing on scratch built piers but could easily be fully scratch built. In the scene below the all too familiar hut appears!
Eventually a full size mock-up was made, by this stage I had actually extended the board a little at either end. A combination of structures and trees would hide the exits reasonably well.
Ideas are now starting to fall into place and thoughts are turning to how the corkboard inspired scheme can be taken forward...
Some issues with the recent Christmas Pizza have led me to strip back the scenery to almost a bare board with embedded trackwork. There is a chance that I won't be reinstating the snow scene, at least in the same form, having found that keeping track clean and snow were not really compatible! The trees and other bits have been recovered for reuse but in the meantime I've been thinking what could be done in terms of a "re-theme".
I recalled a sketch made some time ago for an O9 scene, representing an estate railway, split into three views of a roadway with vehicle/office or station/yard.
I have now created a couple of sketches of how it could look in practice. From the roadway side (without the vehicle in place) it can be seen that a Port Wynnstay hut and Peco phone box are envisaged, oddly enough both kits are to hand...
The yard side features a grounded van body, inspired by the Peco O-16.5 one used on 'The Headshunt' (indeed there may be a side from it somewhere!) and a series of junk bits.
During the early construction of the Christmas pizza a friend asked if the mounds were going to be sand dunes or snow, which must have struck a chord... A more recent pair of pizza sketches depict the familiar territory of a passenger-carrying seaside miniature railway, but a more run down, lower key setup than that depicted on 'Shifting Sands'.
The sketch on the right uses an ice cream van as part of the disguise of the circuit, and whilst not split directly into thirds as per the estate plan sufficiently breaks up the scene. Wanting to see how it might work I made a sketch of how it might look.
It is funny how I can visualise these ideas but not the layout that I am currently stalled building - the Julian Andrews brickworks inspired scheme...maybe it will come in time?
