An Avalon Arrival

As mentioned a couple of months ago in O9 Archaeology, the revived 7mmNGA sales operation under  has recently turned up several interesting O9 items of late and it has provided an opportunity to acquire a few older commercial O9 models that are no longer in production. With a little Christmas money to spend I picked up another couple of items in early January, including another unopened Owen Ryder kit, this time the Heywood open wagon. Yes, other models are now available of this but I never got around to buying one from Howard Martin when the range was revived...

Since Howard's passing I've felt a small pang of guilt that I actually do not have anything in my collection that truly reflected the Avalon Line range so the opportunity to purchase a ALD2-9 diesel was also taken. It is actually a built and painted example very close in appearance to the one illustrated on the old Black Dog Mining website but differs in small details, including the coupler position. 

I therefore believe that this may actually have been finished by Steve Bennett. It has clearly never had a chassis fitted as the paint underneath shows no signs of wear. In fact an attempt to pose it on a motor-less Farish 08 chassis failed as it was too tight a fit! I am looking at the options to power it, the obvious low-cost way (as the source is in stock) would be to make some careful adjustments underneath to take a Kato 'core' and accept that the wheelbase won't match the axleboxes, but that it won't be too obvious.

An alternative would be to look at repowering the 08 chassis with a Tramfabriek motor but I have some qualms about having a 6-coupled chassis hidden away under there. To my surprise the 08 chassis has been propelled around the 5" curves of 'odsock Corner without any issue. However, a further alternative in the form of a Halling motor unit has been suggested by members of the NGRM Online Forum so that will also be investigated.

Colin

 

Saturday Snapshot - Progress

After all my grass-growing woes of the last month it is very satisfying to bring you this image of how far things have come in recent weeks. The walls and office building are now fixed in place and hopefully it won't be too long before the trees are too...

The weather forecast for the weekend ahead is probably telling me not to spend too much time out in the workshop but we shall see what is possible, I think hairspray dries better in cold weather than PVA, right?

There are a few new developments to come in the next few weeks and maybe one or two changes of mind, watch this space...

Colin

The Green Grass of 2025

A couple of weeks ago I expressed my frustration with my latest efforts to use hanging basket liner grass and that I had purchased a static grass applicator and started experimentation... 

After several colour tests and experience-building sessions on scraps of cork and hardboard I was ready to add some colour to the layout itself. My applicator is the WWScenics Pro Detailer which is ideal for the sort of small projects I wish to complete. Whilst there are a few areas that may benefit from a further layer, I am largely happy with the effect so far.

My initial stock of grasses also came from WWScenics and I may have picked one that was a bit on the bright side. I had it in mind to try and match the sort of colours that I achieved using hanging basket liner and one shade I chose was far too bright. A quick search of eBay found a shade from Woodland Scenics that fitted the bill so an order was placed and further experimentation took place. I wanted to be able to blend with hanging basket shades as I had successfully added a few extra areas of this as shown below, prior to applying the static grass to see how the two could co-exist.

The shades used in the end were a base layer of 2mm WWS 'Muddy' followed by a blend of  4mm Woodland Scenics 'Light green' and WWS 'Muddy'. In places another layer has been added of 6mm WWS 'Patchy' to add variety. I think the colour-blend has worked very well although the static grass is still a touch greener than the hanging basket grass, where it is still visible!

Despite appearances there is still a lot more to do to the grass, adding ground foam etc as I would usually do, plus other growth here and there to break up the texture a little more. There is also a requirement for plenty of leaf litter under the trees, creation of which is now underway.

A quick word for the team at War World Scenics for their excellent customer support after an issue (self inflicted) occurred with my applicator, thank you WWS!

Wishing all readers of O9 Modeller a Happy New Year.

Colin

Seasons Greetings

Where has December gone? There are some exciting scenic developments to report on 'odsock Corner' but they can wait for another day as we switch to 'Christmas Tree Halt'. New additions this year are the post box and a canine companion for the lady waiting on the platform. Both are castings I've had for years, bearing the hallmarks of teenage gloss paint...

Wishing all O9 Modeller readers the best for the season and I hope Santa brings all the modelling goodies you have on your list. If you are in need of any modelling inspiration then why not give our friends at the Micro Model Railway Dispatch a visit? Issue 16 has just been published and 'Christmas Tree Halt' appears way back in issue 3. Talk about time flying!

Colin

 

Hanging Basket Liner Blues

Regular readers will know I've been an advocate of using hanging basket liner to represent grass for about 20 years now, resisting the more popular methods of grass application that have become available... until now. 

Having got the basic ground cover in place I was ready to start the application of hanging basket grass in my usual fashion by laying down neat PVA and applying the brushed hanging basket, letting it dry and pulling the backing off before manicuring it as desired. It failed, twice over. After several sessions I had a very patchy effect and several areas had no effective grass "growth".

I had used my usual PVA, twice. Some of the PVA was absorbed into the material and not bonding to the ground surface. This current PVA is a just post-Covid purchase and I'm not convinced it is as good as the old stuff. I then tried Gorilla PVA and had better results but not perfect, still ending up with some areas entirely not stuck down. I then tried a coat of Matt Medium on the next area to seal the surface first, but it made little difference. The photo above was the result - it may not look too bad in the photo but there should really be grass everywhere...

This is a closer view, PVA was applied across the whole area in front of the rocks!

I have put some of the issues down to the coldness of the workshop during the week I was laying down the grass, hovering a few degrees over freezing most of the time. I have had a few fails before but never to this level and frankly not to this level of disappointment. I have now stripped back a lot of the current grass, sealed the surface with Matt Medium and added a thin layer of ground foam to start again. At around the same time I fixed down the resin tree stump and blended in the ground surfacing around the base.

Whilst I am still a big proponent of this method of creating grass I decided that I could do without the hassle and I therefore bought myself an early Christmas present in the form of a small static grass applicator. Experimentation has begun...

Colin 

Twigging On

A few weeks ago I posted a picture of a twig pretending to be a tree as part of my sketching out of the scenery for 'odsock Corner. Shortly afterwards I started to rework the twig into a tree using some old Hornby wire foliage branches (from the Skale Scenics range 10-15 years ago), removing their lumpy foliage and supergluing them in place on the adapted truck.

At this point I did propose to use another twig to make something a little taller and narrower to better fit this location. It had only taken a couple of hours to get to this stage and I planned to store this  for future use elsewhere. However I then decided to make changes to the existing frame by pointing the branches upwards rather than outwards, and twisting in some extra smaller branches at the extremities. I then used modelling clay to smooth out the joins between the twig and the branches.

To further blend the wire branches to the trunk I mixed up some of my remaining scenic mix of paint/PVA and added in some tile grout to stiffen the mixture, I had hoped this would be a good basis for bark but it dried quite light.

Contrary to popular opinion, tree trunks are not brown, more a grey-brown-green mixture and to create this effect I started with grey primer and Humbrol brown spray paints, spraying uneven coats of them both to create a mottled effect. The brown can was splattering quite a bit and gave up shortly afterwards, another one to add to the shopping list!

To blend the colours together and add shadow into any recesses I gave the tree a wash of black-grey all over and when this was dry I dry-brushed grey-green over the lower trunk and branches, getting as far up as I could angling the brush between the branches. This gave a very pleasing effect and I had one of those "stop" moments before I went too far!

After all this work to the armature I feel that I have achieved a much better shape than I had initially created and a very satisfactory colour. It is now ready to add the foliage in due course before planting it in place on the layout alongside the modified Hornby tree (which requires a few further changes) and the recently purchased fir tree.

More soon...

Colin

'odsock Corner - Bits and Pieces

Where does time go? Work started on these items back in September and has proceeded embarrassingly slowly...

Over time the lamp and the wagon with the missing planks were joined by a few other pieces as ideas developed, the tree stump making an appearance during layout planning and is a Steve Bennett casting. All finally received a coat of primer and were painted over a few weeks and were matt varnished on the weekend just before the weather turned a lot colder. 

The fence is cobbled together from Slaters left-overs from a childhood project and would have been easier to start from scratch but I like to recycle... Also recycled is the bench, another S&D kit, one of a few bits assembled and painted by my Dad for Shifting Sands. It was later removed in favour of a Peco telephone box and I have restored the paintwork on the planking where a figure had been removed leaving the brass strip exposed. It has hidden itself rather well with just some careful colour matching and then dry brushing to match the shade of the lamp post.

Colin