Work is progressing well on the reworking of the pre-built Avalon Line loco. Although I want to keep as much of the original paint finish as possible, I felt that the all-encompassing grey finish needed something to both break it up and add some colour. The obvious and realistic thing to add was an area of red to the buffer beams and/or the coupler blocks. In the end the latter were carefully masked off, only to find that I had no red oxide primer to hand...
After a trip to the local motor factors Hycote primer was applied and then two coats of red acrylic paint. At first this looked rather stark but with matt varnish and weathering applied they have blended in rather well. The tool box in the cab also benefitted from a touch of colour, a metallic blue and one of the in-cab levers gained a red handle.
Meanwhile I had to source a suitable driver figure. I suppose Although I have some 3D printed seated figures none are in a driving pose but I also have a small stockpile of whitemetal and plastic figures to use... I seem to recall that this figure was likely bought in Burton Town Hall, but at one of the DEMU shows rather than the 7mm NGA convention where I would have seen Howard and Steve and not bought models like this!
You may notice that he's had a little surgery (and was a pain to photograph)..
The cap pulled over the eyes to the nose really struck me as not great for any driver, it was only after trying to pose the arms that I realised that maybe the manufacturer meant a road vehicle driver rather than a locomotive driver, and that was his chauffer's cap! The new head, secured with a short length of 0.5mm wire, was sourced from my oddments of plastic figures and is of Preiser origin.
What was originally supposed to be a jacket and trousers has become a boiler suit. Painting was my usual primer/dark wash/almost dry brush of colours and to ring the changes the main colour is green, contributing to the splash of colour methodology. His hands are rather big (maybe he's wearing driving gloves) but I don't think is too noticeable once he's in the cab. He looks like he's in control of the loco even if he hasn't got a full grip on the controls.
More soon, as that final picture reveals, things have progressed well...
Colin
