Exmoor - Paintshop Progress (Part 1)

By the middle of May the Exmoor build had entered the paintshop and the first coats of primer were applied using Halfords aerosol cans. I find it helpful to use red oxide on the buffer beams to avoid too many coats of red acrylic later on. 

I then masked off the smokebox, footplate edges, buffer beams etc, essentially anything that would not be body colour. I then applied Halfords Rover 'Tahiti Blue' from another aerosol. After masking was removed the result was this rather ghostly looking appearance.

The red bufferbeams, cream cab interior and various areas of black were applied by hand using acrylic paints, largely of Vallejo origin. Once a coat of Testors 'Dulcote' had been applied I started the process of assembling various sub-assemblies over the last fortnight, the cab/tank unit being securely fitted to the boiler/front end, then all the pipework was added including the regulator lever to the outside of the dome.

At this stage I gave the model a further waft of Dulcote to hide some of the glue marks and set the model aside for a few days to allow the varnish to fully harden.

To be continued...

Colin

Theakston - Fantastic in Pastic

At the recent 7mm NGA AGM at Burton-upon-Trent Roger Chivers had examples of his second O9 plastic kit on sale. It is for a Ravenglass & Eskdakle 'Theakston' stone wagon and simply requires wheels and couplings to complete.

A very pleasant 45 minutes of my time one evening put the parts together. I must admit I did struggle to get any wheels into it, I have resorted to a bit of drilling and splaying out of the axle boxes in order to fit Farish coach wheelsets (current production). Technically they are too small at 6mm diameter, but Roger has designed the kit to take the correct 8mm downwards.

The next job was to equip it with MicroTrains couplers. With Farish wheelsets fitted the base of the headstock is 6mm from rail level so only a 1mm deep section needs to be removed to put the coupler mounting height at 7mm.

You can just make out in this picture where the middle bar of the chassis frame is cut back to clear the coupler and to give it space to move backwards to function.

I then made a refinement to the top edge of the body in an attempt to reduce it's visual thickness. I have removed some material at a 45 degree angle, carefully stopping at the line of moulded rivets on the sides. This is a trick I've used in the past on items such as Airfix mineral wagon kits and once painted should trick the eye into believing the top edge is thinner.

Whilst at Burton Steve Lamb's 'Reclaim' caught my eye. A development of the Julian Andrews' 'United Brick' layout plan (now of course Howard Martin's 'Avalon Brickworks') this has provided much food for thought, and the possibility of an O9 version using materials stored in the workshop is quite apealing...

Colin

What a load of rubbish!

As a diversion from the ongoing build of the Exmoor 0-6-2T I recently raided the bits boxes and produced a range of lineside clutter that could grace the yard of a future O9 shed or workshop scene. I suppose they complement the recently completed coach under repair.

There's a fair bit of history here. The cab contains parts from numerous half-started projects, the wooden planking is rejected parts from one of my O-16.5 wagon builds; the lattice girders were once intended as a water tower base for 'Shifting Sands'; the door is a left-over from carriage building at the time the Avalon Line masters were made; the wheels are the left-overs from my Del-Prado based Bassett-Lowke Class 30 project and the saddle tank from Badger. The litter bin is a resin casting I acquired some time ago, painted up with a forthcoming project in mind.

The bits box also contained what was due to be part of the kitchen equipment for the kiosk on 'Shifting Sands'. I decided to challenge myself to make it a workbench with a few items of equipment on it, all from the bits boxes. This is the result...

Apart from a piece of 1/16th" brass tube, the drill press is made entirely from re-purposed Dapol Railbus kit underframe parts, as is the tool box, and the majority of the vice (some Knightwing loco kit parts ended up in there too). The file and piece in the vice are Duncan Models castings. It will need a little more junk adding in due course once it has a home to go to. I may now have a go at making some more workshop equipment from the bits boxes, watch this space...

You may think that all this points to a workshop diorama being planned, and you might be right. However, what emerges in due course may be another scene completely involving that litter bin, we shall see. I have been working on a potential diorama base using something that may look rather familiar.

I'm just having to resist making it into a micro layout....

Colin

Spirit of Exmoor

You may think that in the two months since I last showed progress on my Exmoor Steam Railway 0-6-2T build I might have finished and painted it... well one of those is true, it is complete structurally and in detail. To celebrate I photographed her on 'The Headshunt'.

Since the last photographs you will notice that a lot more detail has been added. Some of this is from commercially available parts, suitably modified, others are scratchbuilt. Additions include the following:

• Cylinder covers using some Dapol railbus mouldings suitably modified.
• Bolt heads on headstocks and cylinders from Plastruct hex section.
• Coal rails from Peco N-gauge coke wagon rails.
• Dome from a modified Langley 'Lyn' casting, with new safety valves (Hornby spares) and whistle by Buzz models.
• Chimney from modified Gem base and cap with brass tube in between to extend the height.
• Tank fillers from Gem castings, with handrail knobs added as handles.
• Smokebox door handle from Hobby Holidays.
• Various pieces of plumbing from brass and phosphor bronze wire, split pins and fuse wire. This includes steam pipes and ejector pipework. 

Now the weatherman promises a warm weekend, so the primer spraying forecast is good...

Colin

(Still) Stuck in a Siding

Some progress to report on the "under repair" Avalon Line coach project, which has now reached completion. As previously described, this example of the kit was one of the early samples that I built, then sold on to Andrew Blackwell, who reduced it in height to match the Shifting Sands examples. In an effort to straighten out a banana shaped roof I managed to break part of one side, setting the path to this project.

I posed the completed coach on 'The Headshunt' and couldn't resist tinkering with the colour settings!

In colour the faded red finish becomes apparent. Rather than spray the red as per most of my fleet, this was brush painted over red oxide car primer. The roof was painted grey and the solebar and underframes a very dark grey.

The acrylic paints were then sprayed with what remained of a can of Citadel (Games Workshop) 'Purity Seal' varnish. This went on a little roughly and far too satin in finish, but I wasn't worried about this, as the next stage in the process was to let it dry for several days, then carefully attack the red and grey areas with 1500 grit wet and dry paper to take the finish back to a worn, matt finish. Various washes were applied to the solebar, underframe and roof, followed by dry brushing to add further wear and tear.

Several areas were given a coat of a red oxide over the top of the weathered finish to represent areas where repainting has taken place, as seen here on the side where the air tank is visible. I have aimed for subtlety rather than a too over-weathered effect. Once it has a permanent home it will no doubt be surrounded by appropriate junk!

Colin

Cover Star

I arrived home this afternoon to find the latest issue of the 7mm Narrow Gauge Association's 'Narrow Lines' had dropped onto the doormat. Staring back at me from the cover was one of my A1 Models locos and 'The Headshunt' diorama...

I had been tipped of by the editor that this was going to appear, but it is very nice to come home to it on a Friday!

Colin

Stuck in a Siding

A couple of weeks ago I was offered a couple of Avalon Line 12-seat semi-open coaches by O9 modeller Andrew Blackwell and the offer was too good to turn down. One of the pair was actually my first build of this kit after I had produced the masters for Steve Bennett to cast. Andrew had decided to reduce the height of both coaches to better reflect the originals running of Shifting Sands. Doing this to an already built kit must have been an interesting task!

On arrival I noticed that the coach I built had a distinct warp and I put this down to the way I had built the roof all those years ago. Carefully removing the old roof I managed to replace it, but not without having to do a few other jobs on the way. It was whilst doing this I inadvertently managed to break one of the sides - it's best not to ask how! Although I fixed it it still looked a bit wonky, so I sought another solution. I have often thought of the idea of a coach sat at the end of a siding, or in a workshop, with a few body panels missing as if awaiting or under repair - here was the opportunity...

As can be seen, several panels are missing, I replaced the whole solebar with Plastruct section that matched the original casting, having opened out one panel and completely replaced another with just uprights. I also added uprights under the exposed seat ends to make them it less like the seat backs floated in thin air.

On the opposite side just one panel was opened out. As this exposed the nut that secures the bogie in place I added an air tank from a Dapol Drewery Shunter kit to disguise it. The coach was previously equipped with modified MicroTrains bogies but I have fitted a set of Avalon Line ones for static use. I therefore filled in the gap in the headstocks for the coupler and added a cosmetic coupling pocket that had seen service on a previous static coach (one of the 4-wheel ones that sat behind the caravan on Shifting Sands).

Whilst tinkering with Avalon Line coaches I altered the bogie mounts on my fully enclosed example, removing the MicroTrains pin and socket arrangement and replacing it with the system used on the majority of my bogie stock with a 12BA nut trapped under a styrene mount. The bogies have washers Araldited top and bottom to allow the bolt to pass through neatly. This is a much more robust system than the previous one.

Colin