Atlantic's works: Portable layout update

[James Harrison]

I think that's a more than acceptable result for GCR freight and mixed traffic lining. I keep intending to have a go at drawing some lining up in some drafting software, but it's one of those roundtoit jobs that always gets pushed to the back of the queue (I blame the fact that I'm a draughtsman in my day job, so the last thing I want to do in the evenings and weekends is yet more drawing).

[Atlantic 3279]

As a result of starting to get "all posh and pretentious" with our operating methods on Grantham, to the extent of trying to fit appropriate head code lamps to locos and tail lamps to at least some of the trains, a polite request was made of me to equip my "BTK" No 62790 with brake end lamp irons, so that it might not leave Teak Set 5 with a scruffy backside when said set loses a portion part way through the running sequence. Far be it from me to reject reasonable requests or to uncaringly disappoint fellow enthusiasts, so I decided to do something about it. What puzzled me however was that only the lack of lamp irons had been highlighted. The coach in question was no more than a repaint of an unmodified Margate Gresley-style BCK (hence the quotation marks above around BTK), with the brake end still having an open ended corridor connector complete with the strange, black-painted, non-LNER style internal door with two unexplained square holes, and the buffer heads were still oval - bar the one that was broken of course. Apart from the general shape of the trussing the underframe fittings were all wrong too, and then there was the trifling matter of the coach being 3 scale feet too short and still having the doors / panels / beading on the corridor side arranged as per a BCK...

Never mind, as nobody was complaining about the length or the panel layout, and I certainly did not have time in this case to do one of my full reconstructions, I decided I could satisfy my conscience by means of some more limited improvements.

1. Moulded corridor connector sides drilled then pieces of staples pushed in, adjusted to shape, trimmed and super-glued to serve as lamp irons.
2. Black paper bellows made to fit within moulding, with slight tendency to push out a little, spot glued to the moulded inner door.
3. 0.010" black plasticard cut and scribed to represent a cover for the end of the corridor connector, and spot glued to the paper bellows.
4. Oval buffer heads filed back somewhat and capped with some dished, clipped-top round heads cut from 0.015" black plasticard.

5. Original moulded battery boxes, wrongly placed adjacent to the bogies rather than "amidships" on the underframe cropped off with side-cutters and a couple more pieces of black plasticard scribed to roughly the style of the outer faces of LNER battery boxes stuck in roughly the right place behind the central section of the trussing.

I couldn't fit proper LNER battery boxes because the trussing, like the whole coach, is too short in the vital area. I also decided that although the brake gear on the underframe is in mirror image positions compared to where it all should be, as is the token representation of a dynamo, that would all have to stay as it is for now. Maybe we should offer modest prizes at shows to those viewers who manage to spot (without any prior hints) which coaches are wrong 'uns?

[MikeTrice]

I would tend to agree that the basic body shell, though short, is capable of major improvement. There is something about them that just seems right in terms of profile and they are a LOT cheaper than the later scale length models. Given a good paint job and detail upgrades I think the human brain does not detect the length issues unless it has something to compare with.

[JonBates]

A question if I may?

I think the old short Gresleys are the correct length for some of the Gresley Great Northern coaches. Is that correct? And if it is correct how difficult would it be to alter the coaches to represent these?

Jon

[Atlantic 3279]

Some of the GN stock was definitely built on a 57 foot u/f as per the Margate "Gresleys". I couldn't make the results exactly match any specific GN diagrams but I did alter four such coaches by doing such things as rearranging sections of the sides, substituting home made resin clerestory roofs in 3 cases, changing the ends to include panelled-over former windows, insetting the van portion of the sides on a brake coach so as to accept larger wooden duckets (again in resin) with the loading gauge, substituting Fox bogies on a couple, and completely replacing the trussing plus all other underframe fittings. That's as well as other things like corridor connector and buffer-head upgrades as per the coach just featured, added alarm gear on the roof ends, extra glazing bars inserted into many window frames to create toplights, and eliminating the beading around a couple of compartment doors to create typically GN dummy doors.
You may not feel that you have to do ALL of those things to get the general look of GN coaches - they won't all apply to each coach anyway - but a good look at books featuring GN coaches, and perhaps more usefully at present Ken Hoole's book on the East Coast Joint Stock, will give plenty of inspiration and a good idea of what you need to do to get a believable and reasonably accurate result.

[JonBates]

Thanks for the speedy and comprehensive response. Looks like plenty to keep me busy.

In the loft, somewhere, I have my son’s old Hornby Flying Scotsman set and, if I can ever find it again, i’ll try to make use of the coaches. The minimum will be a re-paint. I’d more or less worked out that the underframe would need a lot of work, also the top lights.....

Whatever it will be a good excuse for a lot of research ( reading books!)

Thanks
Jon

[JASd17]

Michael Harris's GN And ECML Carriage Oakwood book is a very good source too.

Brass etches are available for many later Gresley-style GN types from Wizard models.

John

[jwealleans]

The critical question here is which of those myriad defects will cause most harrumphing from the Official Photographer? I'd say that was well worth the effort.

To really gild the lily there are some letters on the HMRS wagon sheet which are ideal for the 'LNER' on the corridor cover.

[Atlantic 3279]

Thanks for the speedy and comprehensive response. Looks like plenty to keep me busy.

In the loft, somewhere, I have my son’s old Hornby Flying Scotsman set and, if I can ever find it again, i’ll try to make use of the coaches. The minimum will be a re-paint. I’d more or less worked out that the underframe would need a lot of work, also the top lights.....

Whatever it will be a good excuse for a lot of research ( reading books!)

Thanks
Jon

Wondering if it might help you further Jon, I just had a look in the hope of locating my coverage of the conversions I did, in detail. Unfortunately, although all the text is there, over quite a number of pages of this thread around page 200, my image restoration programme (following the loss of third party image hosting facilities) hasn't yet gone far enough to deal with the necessary images.
I'm sure I fairly recently re-posted some images of the coaches as completed, either on here or on RMWeb but my searches have so far failed to locate them.

[jwealleans]

This help?

[JonBates]

John, Graeme, Jonathan

Many thanks for the information, tips and links.

It looks like an idea that is worth trying. Hopefully I’ll be able to get results like yours Graeme - those coaches have real character.

I can now feel the need to venture into the loft and find the old railway stuff....knowing the state of our loft I may be gone some time!

Also on my “to purchase fairly soon” list is one of the RDEB coaches from Wizard....just need to pace myself a little.

Jon

[Atlantic 3279]

This help?

Somewhat! Ta.

I've just noticed that some of the images of the models as finished, not the most helpful ones for a builder interested in methods, can be seen on pages 211 and 212 of this thread.

I've also had a look at the image link codes for the missing images between pages 195 or thereabouts and page 211, hoping that I might see a reasonably quick way to restore the appropriate images in the correct places. Unfortunately, in this case the codes in the expired links to the third party host contain no recognisable trace of the original image codes as stored on my system. As the coach conversions are covered in parallel with other modelling jobs I was doing at the time, which were also illustrated with images from other folders, there's no quick way to identify what goes where! If I eventually get time to read every post and compare with my original images I may be able to sort it all out, but at present there's no hope.

[Atso]

Thanks for showing us your revisiting of those coaches Graeme, page 212 is most useful in explaining your method for teaking. I'll be trying this as my coaches always seem to come out a bit too dark for my liking!

[Atlantic 3279]

Thanks Steve,

I wish I'd recorded the details of the paint / varnish mixtures a bit more accurately, as I'll no doubt want them again myself sometime, all of the original batch having now set solid in the sealed pots.....

On a different matter, I can now reveal just a little of one of the things that has been keeping me very busy of late. I'm on the way to producing a master for a boiler (for resin casting) and will also in due course be catering for a number of the fittings for loco that is a joint project. Most other parts of the loco will be etched, and as I'm not taking the lead in this particular project I feel compelled to leave it to ringleader to tell us more in due course, possibly including the class of loco and the ID of the computer aided draughtsman who made the etching work possible. The ringleader is perhaps better known for building signals, large layouts and control systems that frighten beginners. He was talking a couple of weeks ago of starting to reveal what's going on with this loco, so I hope he won't mind me posting this to prompt him to do so.

I've been working rather carefully with this master, as I don't want the potential high quality and accuracy of the rest of the loco, if built skilfully from the etched parts, to be spoiled by any inaccuracy or roughness of finish in the resin parts. I've also been trying to get a step or two ahead of current needs by ensuring that the boiler is also right for an intended follow-up loco of a different class and for a couple of others too, just in case.

I'm afraid the pictures were the best that could be done quickly in fading evening light. We're getting to that time of year again....

[Atso]

That's a lovely boiler Graeme, I wish I could develope you skill with plastic sheet. It can build plastic kits but not scratch build in that material. Would the boiler be related to another project currently being undertaken by Red Leader on another forum?