Atlantic's works: Portable layout update

[cthompson]

Jonathan was quite right to call my efforts "tarted up"; some vans were required in rather a hurry. You know the sort of thing - rash promises made on the spur of the moment like "I'll make us a class C fitted freight for next week". I'm following your progress with interest and I can see that the "tarts" (well, Prime Pork, Fine Fish et al) will have to come back into the works for a more authentic makeover. Yes they're HB numbers but couldn't get hold of HB transfers in time for the start of the operating season.

[jwealleans]

Now I've had chance to read through the last few pages properly on a computer rather than trying to keep up through the amusing but eye-straining loganberry device, you've made a top job of that GC brake. I shall undoubtedly refer back to that. I am still almost at the point of putting handrails onto the Lima van.

As I don't have my reference books with me can I ask where you found the information on the refrigerated vans and specifically their downgrading for fish traffic? Are there any 'structural' changes involved other than roof hatches? I have our fish train on Pilmoor in mind, as Craig will undoubtedly spot. You also mention that these are the 1986/7 Hornby vans; I don't suppose you could educate us on the different variants? I don't have any of these as far as I recall.

[Atlantic 3279]

Hello "cthompson". First coat of primer on the H & B van revealed all sorts of unsatisfactory things about the plank joints and scribed lines in places. I have been having a go at remedial filling, re-scribing where necessary, and cleaning down rough edges with suitable scrapers and a fibre glass brush. I hope the second mist of primer will reveal a more satisfactory result. Until then, I would say that the benefits of my more thorough tarting up of this van hang in the balance.....

I'm glad you like the GC brake JW. New Tatlow vol 1 has now told me all I want/need to know about the look of its roof fittings, albeit via a photo that is, according to its caption, there to show something entirely different on another vehicle.........

New Tatlow vol 2 contains the information about the cascading of the fridge vans to fish use and in some cases finally to ordinary fitted vans. The ladders and high platforms are removed from the end of the van pictured in fish use, so I presume the ice hatches went to, leaving a plain roof. It appears to be in red oxide livery, with "fish" plate on the door but also "insul meat" branding on the body

Brief digging around on t'internet, including a Hornby Railways Collector Guide (modeltrains.net.au) suggested to me that the F10 fridge vans appeared in the catalogue in '84 to '87(only?), but probably had a bog-standard Hornby underfame with tie bars for '84/'85, gaining the luxurious NE style underframe for '86/'87. A "Wimpy Burger" red liveried version seems to have been available around that time too, but it may only be the "final fling" 1989 edition of this that had the better underframe. More recent China-made examples of the F10 van seem to exist too, but on the wrong underframe again, appearing in a Thomas range "circus" livery as well as a version of NE/LNER refrigerator van livery. Perhaps there are more versions out there with the right underframe, known only to serious collectors and/or a few other buyers?

[jwealleans]

That's really helpful Graeme, thanks. That Hornby collectors site brought back a few memories. I'm very surprised it was only made for four years; I have the vague impression it's quite a common model from my occasional toy fair/swapmeet visits. Hornby have done a more recent vehicle along similar lines, have they not?

I shall peruse Tatlow when I next see the homestead and keep an eye out in Glasgow for a likely candidate. Presumably the earlier issue would be fine from a body perspective but require the underframe replacing?

[Atlantic 3279]

Well, apart from the more recent Chinese productions that I mentioned I don't know whether Hornby did any other F10 re-runs or odd-ball liveries. I can't remember whether I bought my vans late 80s, or early 90s - when they may simply have been old stock in any case.

I have no reason to think that the body is any different on the versions with the wrong underframe. A friend of mine also suspects/vaguely recollects that the underframe has appeared under a couple of other vehicles, possibly a planked open and a tank wagon, so it may be worth looking out for those as underframe donors. Perhaps their bodies, and the wrong underframes from more basic F10 models would then clip together and sell on eBay or the local exhibition junk stall?

I almost had a punt on a "correct underframe" Wimpy van on eBay last night. I might have got it for a mere 99p, but the seller wanted £3.81 postage and even if a red version might have been a better starting point for a red-oxide fish van, I wasn't sure that I wanted to convert a fourth vehicle. In any case, I got busy struggling to set my H & B wheel bearings in the right places, and forgot all about eBay until too late.

[Atlantic 3279]

By the way, if you are clever/lucky enough to be able to identify the right alleged open & tank wagons via a search engine/index based on underframes, my underframes are coded L5682 (inner) and 568(1?) outer. These figures are NOT visible on the assembled model, only being seen on dismantling.

[jwealleans]

Had a quick Google this morning...the Wimpy van seems to be more readily available than the white one, if ebay is anything to go by.

I see Hornby also did the 'H & B' van as a refrigerated version... they must have had their money's worth out of that tooling and then some.

There is also a thread on the old RMWeb I found which more or less reaches the same conclusions you have:

http://www.rmweb.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=20266

It also includes a Roche drawing which may be why Hornby made the mistakes they did on the H & B tooling.

As a total aside, Google's getting a lot quicker, isn't it? My posts from last night were coming up in this morning's search. There used to be two or three days' latency.

[Atlantic 3279]

Yes, Google seems very slick these days. I found that RMweb thread too, and contacted Will (wehf100) as he seemed to be the knowledgeable party. As his interests now lie in another scale we didn't get much further in the quest for information.

[Atlantic 3279]

After remedial treatment to plank joints, more primer, and then a light waft over with a preliminary thin coat of white, that H & B van is, to my relief, looking more reasonable than I thought it would. I've also treated the roof to some better details: Separate w/m torpedo vents which I think are MJT, after firstly trying some "rounder" plastic ones which looked more correct individually but were too big and thus looked too crowded in a cluster of ten. Also plastic rainstrips, which I believe were fitted well before grouping, and whilst I cannot swear to the correctness of the curvature at least the ends ARE visibly tapered down in height as is discernible in photos of these vans. I have also managed to instal bearing cups in enlarged holes in the W irons, at (provisionally) the right height to suit the Mansell wheels now fitted.

[Atlantic 3279]

Although Andrew Hartshorne was able to offer ladder with 10" rather than 9" rung spacing, and a friend who builds exceedingly nice signals amongst other things kindly directed me to a source of parts and a building jig for ladder with 11" rung spacing, I decided ungratefully to have a go at making my own, on the cheap, with nominal 12" dead-on rung spacing.

I firstly cleaned up and taped out some pieces of 0.45mm brass wire on a grid drawn on white card. In hindsight perhaps I should have tinned all of the wire first:

I then applied flux paste, and whilst holding down the top layer of wire(s) locally to ensure contact, I went around the grid one point at a time soldering up with fairly minimal amounts of 145 degree solder, trying to get a neatly flowed out finish. I then detached the wire matrix, cleaned up with files, trimmed down into separate ladders, cleaned up edges again with files (bevelling the ends of the rungs to make them less visibly "out of line" with the stiles), and then de-fluxed the job with a good scrub in kitchen cream cleaner. The whole process wasn't actually that hard to do, just requiring care and thought, which are not always my specialities:

A slight improvement over the original plastic ladder moulding?

[jwealleans]

Definitely an improvement.

[52D]

The ladders for a minimal amount of work have made a great improvement over the original.

[Atlantic 3279]

Although it is far from finished, I have managed to push on significantly with the "downgraded to fish" version of the F10 van. In the process, I noticed that my new thin roof reduced the excess height more than I had managed by simply thinning down the original moulded roofs with moulded ice hatches. On comparing versions, it was evident that the new thin roof was fitting more closely around the eaves of the van, so I have, since taking my pictures, returned to the original versions to do yet more filing in that area.
Reassembly of the fish version taught me something else, via frustration. Hornby moulded-in very little room for the chassis weight in these vans. If, as was the case with my chassis weight, the weight is not truly flat, this factor combines with slight inherent awkwardness of fit and mismatch of sizes in the body, outer chassis, and inner chassis parts, making it impossible to clip the whole lot back together in a snug, stable fit! Even when you are sure that all of the parts are the right way around (and it matters) and that all of the locating pins and tabs are going properly "home", the underframe parts arch their backs, gaping away from the body at the ends/corners, and the axles do not necessarily lie level. Had I not already glued my new roof in place it would have been simplest to glue the weight inside the body instead of trying to include it in the chassis, and I shall do that on the other two vans whose orignal clip-fit roofs are still loose. In the case of this fish van I had to file down the weight, screw the underframe to the body at the corners, and generally fight the thing all the way to make it look right . I wonder if these chassis assembly/stability problems in some way account for the more recent re-releases of these F10 vans having reverted to a standard, non-NE pattern, Hornby underframe?

[Atlantic 3279]

For a change of theme, I spent last evening repairing an old articulated triplet dining set, probably a PC kit, that I bought in need of TLC some some years ago. I've abandoned my then intention of making use of it myself as I'm not now at all convinced that it fits in with my layout location and the rest of my coaching stock. Does anybody think they might be interested in this set before I bung it on eBay?

[Atso]

The triplet is in the wrong scale for my Graeme but I'd loved to see some pictures before you sell it!