Ready To Run

So after the helpful advice from Paul and Bill in the comments to the previous post I've gone ahead and fitted the Greenwich couplings to all three OO9 items I've built so far.

As a compromise between aesthetics and functionality I've only added the hook part to both ends of the locomotives while the open carriage also has the loop fitted at both ends. I'm a little concerned about one of the loops as while a magnet held near it causes it to lift, it doesn't always drop back into place reliably, but I can probably tweak that at a later point when I actually start thing about where the uncoupling ponits will be, but for that I still need to decide on a layout plan.

Curling

Now I know that curling is traditionally played with large chunks of granite but I've been having fun with my DAS clay cobbles curling all on their own. The problem occurred when I started work on another layout experiment to see how the approach I had settled on for making and painting cobbles worked over a larger area. I used a piece of foam board as the base and made the mistake of assuming it was rigid enough not to curl as the modelling clay dried. It wasn't. Fortunately it wasn't the end of the world; I used a sharp knife to remove a small sliver from the bottom cardboard layer of the foam board allowing me to bend the board enough to remove the curl and so the board would sit flat.

With this experiment I went a little further than just modelling cobblestones though, as you can see from this photo of the Meridian Models kit I recently completed.

I thought I'd take the opportunity to make a start on figuring out how I'm going to construct at least some of the buildings on the layout, and to turn the cobblestones into more of a photographic plank where I can pose the rolling stock as it is built.

I'm not going to go into any details on how I put the building together as it really isn't worth the telling (it's an embarrassing mix of double sided tape and PVA glue, with some badly thought out card formers) other than to point out that everything you can see was printed from one or more scalescenes.com sheets. All the structures on Jerusalem were built from scalescenes.com kits and I was impressed by how (relatively) easy they were to build and how realistic they looked. This scene is actually made up from a few parts from their small goods store kit (it used to be a free download but seems to have disappeared from their site) while the wall is from the ashlar texture sheet and the roof from grey roof tiles. The structure itself is inspired by a similar structure at the Leeds Industrial Museum (see this excellent photo).

I'm quite happy with how this has all turned out. The cobbles look good over a larger area, the scalescenes.com papers have produced a reasonable building, which would be improved with extra detailing on a real model (gutters, drain pipes etc.) so now all I really need to get cracking on the layout itself is a track plan. I really should give it some more thought, but I'll probably get distracted by some more locomotive and rolling stock construction first!

Almost There

As you can see I've now finished the workman's open coach (other than fitting couplings, but I'm going to wait until I have something to couple it to). It took me a little longer than planned as I managed to misplace one of the sprues which forced me to tidy and clean my study before I could finish it. Given that I'm intending to use this wagon when the layout is dressed as a modern day industrial museum I've kept the weathering quite light and mostly focused on adding some dirt to the wooden floor. This treatment of the wood doesn't show up too well in the photo but I'm fairly happy with it.

The one thing that concerns me is that the model is very light which might affect it's running quality. On larger OO models there is nearly always somewhere to add some weight but on this model there really isn't any spare space. One option would be to box in one or more of the under seat areas and fill this with liquid gravity, but I think I have a better solution; I'm going to hide the weight in plain sight. My solution is to add reasonably heavy white metal tourists to the wagon. They will not only help bring the layout to life but will easily add extra weight. The only problem is, I'm struggling to find any appropriate figures. Dart Castings do a set of seated figures, but a) they are cast in pewter specifically to keep the weight down and b) I'm not sure from the picture that they will really work as modern day tourists. Does anyone know where I might find some more appropriate white metal seated figures?

Nowhere To Sit (Yet)

So having work on the workmen's open coach yesterday, the main body has come together very quickly. It's not that I spent a lot of time on it, but rather that what you see here is just six, fairly large, parts (plus the wheels) none of which required much cleaning up before assembly. It only took me as long as it did because the sides aren't symmetrical and I fitted the first one to the wrong side, and then there was a little filler needed at the joins between the four sides.

Normally I fully assemble a model before starting to paint it so that a) I don't mess up bits I've already painted, and b) so that I get a better feel for how I want the model to look. In this case though I've followed the suggestion in the instructions to paint the body and floor before fitting the seats.

The floor is meant to look as if it is made from wooden planks and currently is way too light. I'm intending to tone this down with some dry brushing and weathering powders to give an uneven wear look to the floor, but I think that will be done after I've fitted the seats so I know which bits will have had more wear. As well as the seats there is the rest of the brake assembly to fit to the underframe before I then try and make up some couplings, which actually looks like it might be more complex than building the rest of the coach.

One problem I did encounter (and that others building the same kit might) is that the wheels were extremely difficult to fit. Usually on a kit like this either the axle boxes and supports are slightly flexible allowing the wheels to be pushed in with a little bit of force to bend the supports, or the two sides of the underframe are glued together trapping the wheels in place. This kit takes the first approach, but unfortunately the plastic isn't at all flexible. This made it very difficult to get the wheels in place. In fact when trying to apply enough pressure I managed to slide one of the wheels out of position on the axle. I've pushed it back roughly into position (using my digital callipers to try and check the back to back measurement), but I need to get hold of a proper back to back gauge to be sure. I was going to ask if anyone knew where I could get one from as a quick web search hadn't been helpful, but then Paul left a comment on yesterdays post mentioning that Markits do a nice back to back gauge, so that's that problem solved!

Waggons Roll!

Having finally returned from my work meeting (which incidentally has furnished me with photos for a future post) I thought I'd make a start on some rolling stock from the selection the postman delivered last week. As the powered chassis I need for the diesel locomotive hasn't arrived yet (it's apparently left Tokyo and is on it's way) I thought I'd start with the workman's open coach kit from Meridian Models.

This kit represents an open coach which ran as part of the workman's train from 1880 to 1957 at Penrhyn Quarry in Wales. While rolling stock such as this wouldn't have been common in a Yorkshire mill complex, I'm intending to use it when the layout runs as a modern industrial museum and it will be populated by smiling tourists. There aren't that many parts so hopefully it will go together fairly easily, especially as the mouldings look nice and crisp so there shouldn't be too much cleaning up required.

Today's Post

The post has just arrived which included a very interesting box of bits for the new layout:

I'll go into more detail as I put each thing together but there is the wonderful little diesel loco from Narrow Planet, a workman's coach from Meridian Models, and a set of Greenwich Couplings and associated uncoupling magnets etc. all ordered from Parkside Dundas. It's a real shame that due to work meetings I'm not going to get any modelling done for about a week.