As I've mentioned many times the kit is specifically designed to build into Dorothea, Hunslet Engine Company works number 763, and it contains appropriate name plates on the etched brass fret of parts. These, like the rest of the etchings, are exceptionally well done, and I thought it a shame for them to just disappear into the bits box without showing them to you. I also decided to use them to decide which colour the actual name plates should be painted; most are either black or red and as I had two plates to experiment with I painted one black and one red. If you don't know how to paint the name plates then Narrow Planet have produced a useful video. Once the paint had dried, holding the fret up against the locomotive and the decision to paint them black was fairly quickly arrived at, as it looks much better against the crimson body colour.
As I mentioned in a previous post as well as replacement nameplates I'd ordered matching Hunslet Engine Company workplates as well from Narrow Planet. Specifically I'd ordered a customized set of these plates intended for Brian's other Quarry Hunslet kit of Velinheli. I'm not going to give away the name yet, so I've just borrowed the artwork from the Narrow Planet website so you get a feel of what I'll be adding.
The final step before adding the plates is to produce paper templates to aid in positioning them on the model. Remember these things are going to be tiny, and will be difficult to accurately position, especially once the back is sticky with glue or varnish to hold it in place.
On a related note, when browsing through the Narrow Planet website I spotted that the Lancashire & Yorkshire Railway number plates (the standard size not the smaller pug plates) that I discussed in detail back in 2012 are now available as a standard item, which will be great for anyone wanting to renumber the recent Bachmann model of the Aspinal 2-4-2T, especially anyone who wants an L&YR version but missed out on the limited number available in that livery.
Paper templates - genius! I'll be stealing that idea at some stage.
ReplyDeleteThe templates do make life a little easier, they certainly make it harder to get glue or varnish all over the model.
DeleteI had thought of refining the idea slightly, which would be to use masking tape to attach the plate to the template, and then the template to the model but only on one side so it hinged. You could then apply glue to the back of the plate, and lower the template into position, which should be a lot easier. Once dry you should just be able to remove the masking tape. The downside is that only works for certain shapes, whereas this approach works reasonably well no matter the shape, as long as you can draw the template (I measured up and then drew it in Inkscape so it was nice and accurate).