Peco Skips as RTR O9?

Having been seduced by the Peco 009 'Rugga' V-Skips as a fine example of UK-made ready-to-run model railway equipment, my mind has started to wonder if they could form the basis of O9 models. This may seem a wild idea but there are two factors to consider:

• Real skip wagons came in a variety of sizes.
• The necessities of RTR 009 manufacture mean that the models are closer to 5mm+ scale than 4mm.

So some research started, firstly by posing a wagon with a 7mm scale figure to see how it might look:

It doesn't look too ridiculous so I carried out some further research. Two sources were consulted:

1. The 2016 NGRS reprint of the Robert Huddson 1915 Edition 'Light Railway Material', p49.
   This contains dimensions of a 20" gauge 13.5 cubic feet 'double side tip wagon'
2. 'The Blakesley Miniature Railway', Dr Bob Tebb, Silver Link 2009, p94
   This describes skips made by Busch of Bauten, Saxony, which may have been the type supplied to Blakesley Hall.

From that information I compiled the following table of dimensions at 1/43rd scale:

	Peco (mm)	Hudson (mm)	Hudson 1/43	Blakesley (mm)	Blakesley 1/43
Wheel Diameter	6.0	225	5.2	300	7.0
Height from Rails	18.5	1000	23.3		0.0
Width over all	25.0	1250	29.1	1160	27.0
Length Over all	31.0	1500	34.9	1530	35.6

As can be seen, the Peco skip is a little smaller than these examples but not beyond the realms of possibility. However, if you re-calculate the dimensions to 1/48th scale....

	Peco (mm)	Hudson (mm)	Hudson 1/48	Blakesley (mm)	Blakesley 1/48
Wheel Diameter	6.0	225	4.7	300	6.3
Height from Rails	18.5	1000	20.8		0.0
Width over all	25.0	1250	26.0	1160	24.2
Length Over all	31.0	1500	31.3	1530	31.9

That brings the dimensions even closer and makes the Peco V-Skip a realistic prospect for O9 (or indeed On18) use. Just be mindful that is is a lot smaller than most other commercially available O9 wagons and locomotives (which may be larger than scale). I posed my wagon with SMR no.3, which is a reasonable 15" gauge pleasure line sized machine and it doesn't look too bad, but a shorter loco such as a scale length Lister would look even better....

Food for thought?

Colin